When It Is Hmm Rather Than Aha

Has something ever happened to you that at the time you had no idea why it occurred? Maybe without warning you lost your job. Perhaps a long-term relationship ended suddenly. You seemed to have life by the tail when out of the blue, you felt more like the tail. Sometimes things happen without warning or without explanation. There are times when somewhere down the road, we find out why those previously un-understood things happened. We can say, “Aha!,” now I understand. There are also times however when no real answer ever seems to come and we are left wondering, “Hmm?”

If you know me, or have read my writings, then you know that about sixteen months ago I suffered a stroke. A stroke that had no explanation. I had none of the typical symptoms that often lead to strokes. I have not been fearful of suffering another stroke. But, in all honesty, since there was no known reason, I did wonder if another would occur at some point. That thought quietly lurked somewhere in the caverns of my brain.

Well, last week we found the likely cause of my stroke. Atrial flutter. Atrial flutter is a cousin to Atrial fibrillation (Afib), both heartbeat irregularities. The week began with me short of breath and a feeling that my heart was racing. After a visit to my primary care doctor and an EKG in her office, I ended up first in the emergency room and then admitted to the hospital for what ended up being five days.

During my hospital stay it was determined that this flutter had gone on for a long time, undetected. Arrhythmia is known to cause blood clots, which can be dislodged from one of the heart’s chambers and move to the brain, creating a blockage that causes a stroke. My “Hmm?” turned to “Aha!.” My irregular heartbeat was fixed, first by an electrical shock that put my heart back into a normal sinus rhythm. After that, a surgical procedure was done whereby catheters were inserted into my heart to find and close the irregular electrical circuit that was causing my abnormal heartbeat.

Often times God works in ways that at the time make no sense to us. It is “Hmm?” and not “Aha!” He gives us the what, the when, the where, often without the why. Sometimes what God calls us to just does not make sense to us. To us, in our very limited perspective. The Bible reveals some things that are simply “hard to understand” (2 Peter 3:16). The apostle Paul, after eleven chapters of trying to explain God’s glorious mysteries, says this – Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” (Romans 11:33-34).

God said this to Isaiah – For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts (55:8-9).

Rather than waiting for that “Aha!” moment, we are called to respond to God in the same way that Simon did when Jesus asked him to do something that was not understandable by Simon. Here is what Simon said – Master, we have toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets (Luke 5:5).

God does not enable us to understand everything completely. During his last week on earth, when Peter balked at Jesus washing his feet, here is what Jesus says – What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand (John 13:7).

So, unlike trying to figure out the reasons of life, God calls us to simply obey. Obedience. Not a word we like, but one that being a faithful follower of Jesus requires.

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