“…and His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor,
Mighty God…” Isaiah 9:6b
Before teaching a Bible story lesson to children, we prepared an experiential activity for them to engage in that would cause a question in their minds related to the lesson aim. One such activity was like a human Gordian knot! The children would stand in a circle and be instructed to grab a hand of someone not on either side of them. As the kids scrambled to do this they might climb over or under the clasped hands of others. When they were all connected, they were told to untangle themselves back to a circle without breaking hands. It was a giant frustrating human Gordian knot and the kids could not do it….on their own! They would have to call on a leader to stand on a chair and tell them how to untangle themselves and he/she also had the power to unclasp hands as needed. Afterwards, we would ask them what it would mean to them to know there is such a powerful person who wants to help them in their own lives.
When we cannot see a way out or a direction to go, we have an Almighty God with us! In Isaiah, one of the newborn’s names was and is Mighty God, the one who rescued the Hebrew people time and time again when there was literally no way out but for Him. Both the Nicene and the Apostles Creeds name in their first lines the Father as Almighty God. This foundational truth is needed especially in the darkness of today’s hopelessly confused and broken culture. Our Almighty God wants us to call upon Him so we can be lights to give people hope and salvation where they see none. It is in knowing the Almighty God that we get our sight corrected.
There is a famous book by Elizabeth Elliot entitled In the Shadow of the Almighty. In it she tells the true story of what happened when her husband Jim and four other missionaries tried to bring the truth of the gospel to the Waodani (Auca) Indians in Ecuador’s jungle. From the world’s perspective (sight), it ended tragically in the death of all the men. But in the sight of our Almighty God, the purpose was greater, not only in the eventual turning to Christ of the Waodanis (even the killers), but also in the calling of hundreds into the harvest as laborers in the field.
The title of her book comes from Psalm 91:1
“Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty”
When we don’t know what or how or why, we can still act on the truth our God is Almighty and rest in His purpose. After all, we have read the end of the book! So let us remind each other we can “rest in the shadow of the Almighty” and see correctly!
Francie Overstreet