Not knowing

This morning, I was reading from At the Back of the North Wind, by George Macdonald (I haven't read it before). In it, Macdonald writes about a little girl's dream in which she opens a box out of curiosity, and her action has unpleasant consequences. The box was something that, if she had really listened to an authority figure and trusted that person to know best, she would not have opened.

This post is going to sound a lot like my first one, because it's about being content with not knowing. Not, in this case, specifically not knowing why, but not knowing what's going to happen next. If I had to say what my greatest fear is, I would have to say "not knowing". Not knowing what's going to happen next, or not knowing what's going on right now. Unfortunately, I'm a human being with a finite brain, someone without the power to read someone else's mind or see into the future. To me, this seems like an issue, a problem that I ought to solve. I'd like to go around as a detective until I know what's going on; I'd love to get God to show me His plan for me, or at least a little bit more of it than I can see right now.

But, like the girl in the book, or Pandora and her box, or Eve and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (I've never found the word "knowledge" in that name so significant before), if I trust God to know what is best, if I trust Him to take care of my future, if I trust Him to let me know as much as it is good for me to know, then I should be content.

I've got to stop trying to open that box.