Recognizing elegance

One day, we cleaned our our family vehicle. The main task is sifting through the debris on the floor, determining what is trash and what needs to be put away. Whatever we find either goes into the trash bag or the “keep” bag.

One item found among the debris was a cheese-burger sized, unique plastic object. It was not a wrapper or packing from a Amazon shipment. It was made of very durable, impact-resistant plastic with a slightly textured outer surface. It was rounded in some areas, but had tabs with sharp edges in others.

It seemed to be a piece of something.

We did not know exactly what it was, but this we knew: it was not trash. It had a purpose.

So it was placed in the “keep” bag.

Later we realized that it was a specially designed piece of the seat belt assembly. When snapped into place, one can see it is perfectly designed to function in a way that keeps the fabric clean, and probably keeps people from getting snagged on exposed metal parts. Even if it's appearance was not self-explanatory and we did not know all the specifics, we had good reason to assume it was designed for a reason.

The tagline for this site refers to observing elegance in God’s design for women. This does not refer to pearl necklaces or crystal chandeliers. There is another meaning for the word elegance. Wikipedia writes:

In engineering, a solution may be considered elegant if it uses a non-obvious method to produce a solution which is highly effective and simple. An elegant solution may solve multiple problems at once, especially problems that are not thought to be inter-related.

Like the unique, plastic object we found, which turned out to be a precise piece of our vehicle’s interior, we can look at isolated scriptures and find them perplexing. We may be tempted to discard them. We may label them obscure. We might hold them up to a magnifying glass and seek nuances which will make them more palatable.. but then less applicable. We may set them aside, wrongly assuming they are not integral in understanding God’s purposes.

Every word of God is pure:

he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.

Proverbs 30:5

A Bible teacher once stated his desire was to study a chapter verse by verse, getting as much out of each verse as possible. But, then he also said he recognized the need to not miss the big picture. We, too, need to look verse by verse, while also zooming out to see the big picture.

When believers are seeking the will of God in his word, our desire is to hold to his exact instructions. We may find an isolated instruction or statement, and rightly zoom-in and focus on words, debate them, and define them.

What is the headcovering, and is it for today?

Must a woman be silent in the meeting of the church?

In what circumstances may a woman teach?

We zoom in so we can find out what certain words really mean-- the exact definition of a preposition, or the boundaries of passages concerning this or that issue. These are all VITAL things to discern. No doubt.

But we might forget to zoom out... and see the entire car’s interior, so to speak.

So, back to elegance. The Creator possesses much more wisdom and purpose than any car manufacturer, and his creation is telling of his glory. We are going to find things in scripture that we do not intially understand, but we will not discard them, because we know the perfect wisdom of our Designer

God's creation is telling of his glory, and we have the same Creator, and the same ability to tell of his glory!

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways, saith 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.

Isaiah 55:8-9