I make known the end from the beginning,
from ancient times, what is still to come.
~Is. 46.10
Relationships are built on trust. It is very difficult to have any sort of intimate, lasting, or fulfilling relationship with someone we do not trust.
Over and over in scripture God is said to be trustworthy (Deut. 32.4, 2 Sam. 7.28, Ps. 93.5, 1 Thess. 5.24). Isaiah offers one more reason God is trustworthy.
The End From The Beginning
There are very few, if any, things we know the ending of before they have begun. There are far too many variables to know with certainty. The underdog wins when there appears to be no hope whatsoever of such a victory. The sure thing collapses in a pile of dust. The child raised by a single parent in poverty becomes the world’s foremost neurosurgeon. And the God-Man, whose life was foreshadowed from the beginning of time, suffers a horrendous death. What appears to be defeat becomes victory when He rises from the dead and offers redemption to the world.
God knows each of these. He orchestrates each one. Before each one of us is born, God knows how we will live our lives. He knows how we will squander the gifts and recourses He has given us to steward and He knows how He will redeem those squandered moments for our good and His glory.
God knows, from long ago, the abuse, injustice, inequity, suffering, pain, and sorrow that will come our way. And there, too, He already knows how He will weave them together to create beauty out of what is nothing more than a pile of ashes.
This knowing the end from the beginning is not God’s only attribute. This, coupled with His love, grace, mercy, justice, righteousness, goodness (the list could go for pages), makes Him trustworthy. We don’t know what tomorrow will bring. We don’t even know what the next moment has in store. How many lives have been changed in a single moment? But we can trust the One who knows the end of every beginning, the end of every story, the end of every trial, even the end of time itself. He alone is worthy of our complete trust.