Human Logic Or The Logic Of God? … Hello weekend readers. I am writing this musing a week before sending it because we will be off-duty July 22-28 and we’re taking the Mini-Lite camper up to the Collegiate Peaks in Colorado. Our campsite is over 10,000 feet so we will relish the cold nights and the days that rarely go over 70 degrees! And yes, we will be taking our bear-spray!

I’ve already had people say “isn’t it illogical at that altitude—how can you breathe?” It’s true, enjoying the top of mountains is not for everyone but if you can take the altitude, you will find beauty beyond your imagination. Of course, this is our human logic but so far it is something we’ve done for a long time and even at our 70’s age, we find ourselves loving high altitudes and it doesn’t bother us. In fact, leaving Wisconsin for higher peaks was something that we wanted to do and in Arizona they have them as well as the Southwest which is now home for us.

The move—over 1900 miles was challenging. Once in Arizona we also moved several times in the state. God was directing us: my future ministry—Al’s future job. Each move definitely tugged at our feelings but we knew that God’s logic was definitely better than ours! So, we sold a home-bought a townhouse-sold it, bought land-put up our house-then retirement came and we sold the home to live in a 45ft RV. You may think logic just went out the window but we felt God was in each of our moves.

Remember the story in Luke 5 where Jesus tells Peter to put out into the water to catch fish? Using the The Passion Translation Bible, here’s a refresher about the logic of Jesus—enjoy!

“On one occasion, Jesus was preaching to a crowd on the shore of Lake Galilee. A vast multitude of people was pushing to get close to Jesus to hear the word of God. He noticed two fishing boats at the water’s edge, with the fishermen nearby, rinsing their nets. Jesus climbed into the boat belonging to Simon Peter and said to him, “Let me use your boat. Push it off a short distance away from the shore so I can speak to the crowd.” Jesus sat down and taught the people from the boat. When he had finished, he said to Peter, “Now row out to deep water to cast your nets and you will have a great catch”… Peter replied, “we’ve just come back from fishing all night and didn’t catch a thing. But if you insist, we’ll go out again and let down our nets because of your word.” When they pulled up their nets, they were shocked to see a huge catch of fish, and their nets were ready to burst! They waved to their business partners in the other boat for help. They ended up completely filling both boats with fish until they began to sink! When Peter saw this astonishing miracle, he knelt at Jesus’ feet and begged him, “Go away from me, Master, for I am a sinful man!” Peter and the other fishermen—including his fishing partners, Jacob and John…were awestruck over the miracle catch of fish. Jesus answered, “Do not yield to your fear, Simon Peter. From now on, you will catch people  for salvation!” After pulling their boats to the shore, they left everything behind and followed Jesus.”  

What makes sense to Jesus is often absurd by human logic. Yet we humans are usually more comfortable with our logic, right? But Jesus has a pattern of audacious action! I use this word Jesus can push us to do things we would never do. “Jesus, really, isn’t this illogical?” we ask. Not to Jesus, because he knows exactly what he is doing in our lives.

If you were one of the fishermen that day, and decided to not listen to Jesus’ instruction to put the boat out in the deep water you would have missed the miraculous catch of fish! How many times in our lives do we push away God’s logic for our own—lots. We like to use our own ideas but there are times God has something way different for us and what God wants for us is always better than what we think we should have or do…we need to trust God!!

The day we sold our home and moved out into an RV a lot of our family and friends thought we were nuts. But we knew God was moving us into this way of life because God wanted us to explore his creation and enjoy being campground hosts—something we wanted to do in our retirement. Oh, the logic of us compared to the logic of God—there is NO comparison. So, the next time God has you ‘on-the-move’ don’t hesitate. Trust in God’s logic and you won’t miss the miraculous “catch!” AMEN.