Comprehending a Big God With a Tiny Brain

...by Andi Grimes

It may seem weird that I am going to start off a blog post about God with a video of Neil DeGrasse Tyson talking about life on other planets. If you are unfamiliar with him, he is a famous astrophysicist, and a vocal atheist. Even with that second part, I am still a big fan of his. And, I promise, this video will illustrate the point that I want to make. This is a long video, and interesting, but the part that I am going to reference starts at about 7:40
 

To sum up for those who didn’t feel like watching a video, Dr. Tyson points out that the DNA difference between us and a chimp is 1%. That’s it. 1%. And, imagine if there were life on other planets that is 1% in the other direction from us and chimps- what would they know? How would they look at us?

Think about that 1% for a minute- then multiply it by God; The God that breathed the universe into existence. That’s a lot more than 1%, right? We are like an ant trying to comprehend human beings.  How would an ant describe humans? Would they even have the capability to begin to describe what a human is?

So, how can we expect to fully comprehend God? When we read the Bible, we are reading God put into words- the words created by our tiny, limited minds. When Jesus came to Earth, the words he spoke created new understanding of God, which makes sense considering he was God and human. But, even with that, you can see that humans were then, and are still now, a bit dense. The disciples, who lived with Jesus, still didn’t get what Jesus was saying to them much of the time. Jesus told them that the temple would be destroyed and rebuilt in 3 days, and it wasn’t until after Jesus’ resurrection that they had any idea what he was talking about. I always imagine Jesus looking at them with his hand on his forehead saying, “Guys, we went over this multiple times. Why were you confused?” But he knew why they were confused.
This brings me back to my point. Humans are dense. We don’t understand God, even when he is here on Earth talking directly to us. We are not able to fully comprehend God because we are ants in comparison. We cannot say with any certainty that we understand His ways or His plans. We can’t. And, really, we shouldn’t. There will be a day when each of us meets God in His full splendor, but at that time we will not be confined by the limitations of our physical being. And maybe that’s the point. Until then, we can study the Bible, but understand that what we have is an ant’s understanding of human. We will always be tiny in our understanding of the divine.

“For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts are higher than your thoughts” Isaiah 55:9 NLT