“He could pick a scab off a baby’s bottom with that thing!” The guy was talking about a skilled heavy equipment operator on the highway crew where I was working for the summer. It really was impressive to watch how he controlled the massive power of that giant machine with precision and such a light touch. In his hands, that great power was gentle.
That sounds like an oxymoron to say powerfully gentle. We tend to think, powerfully destructive. The most powerful thing humans have created was anything but gentle. It was the Tsar Bomba, a nuclear bomb, tested by the Russians in 1961. It’s power was 1500 times greater than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Anything but gentle.
How much power does God have? The sun puts out 1800 million times more energy than the Tsar Bomba – every second! How many other suns are there? Scientists say around 400 billion, billion others. That’s not a typo. 400 billion, billion suns, millions of times more powerful than the Tsar Bomba. And that’s just in the observable part of the universe… The Creator of all that has power surpassing the sum of all of them. And yet, God controls His power with amazing delicacy, gentleness and precision.
“See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power, and his arm rules for him. See, his reward is with him, and his recompense accompanies him. He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young.” (Isaiah 40:10-11)
That’s a description of God’s unlimited power, unleashed with tenderness. For sure, God has the power to lay waste to whole nations. He could smash you flat with His fist. But when we open our hearts to Him, His power is shown to us with gentleness. If you let Him, God can pick the scabs off your heart with amazing precision and tenderness.
PS: Check out this sermon from Charles Spurgeon, published in 1916: (Click Here)
FRESH BREAD OF LIFE 