Finite

I am limited. I am finite.

When I look at my home, my marriage, and my kids and then look at my two hands and two feet, my intellect, emotional reserves, and the clock ticking on the wall, I feel so limited. The needs within my home and my family are often bigger than my resources.

How much more so when I look at the needs of my city, Bangkok, my countries, the US and Thailand, and this big, beautiful, broken world? I turn and look at myself and recognize that, without a doubt, I am limited. I am finite.

Into this space, come these two nuggets of wisdom, and I know the Infinite One is whispering Truth to me that swallows up the truth of my finite-ness.


"Our personal life is a finite thing: it is limited in every direction, in space, in time, in knowledge, in power. But God is not so limited. He is eternal, infinite, and almighty."


"It helps now and then to step back and take the long view.

The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God's work…

…We cannot do everything and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something and to do it very well. It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders
Ministers not messiahs
We are prophets of a future not our own."

I pray that we would acknowledge our limits and allow them to be enveloped in the limitlessness of God. May we listen carefully to discern what God is inviting us to do, and what he is not inviting us to do. And may we do it well, trusting God to carry it to completion.

(Quotes from J.I.Packer "Knowing God" and from Archbishop Oscar Romero who was martyred for his human rights advocacy)