A parable and more thoughts on the Glory of God

There once was a boy who lived on the coast. His father was a fisherman who spent days at a time out at sea. One night a terrible storm swept over the area while the man was out in his boat. The next day he was found washed up on shore barely alive. As he lay gasping on the doctor’s bed, he grabbed his son’s hand and panted, “The sea is a wild thing my boy. I knew every sandbar, every current, every wind, but the sea itself is unfathomable.”

If men could return from the dead; if great saints of old could write one last appendix to their institutes and systematic theologies, I think it would read similarly to this fictional sailor’s words. I knew every doctrine, every creed, every confession, but YHWH in His glory is beyond our finite minds.

The implication here is not that He is broader than the Scriptural confines He has set for Himself, but that He is deeper than we have or can imagine.