No mind has conceived.

"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him."- Isaiah 64:4

I can't tell you how many times I've glossed over this verse and thought, wow, I wonder what great thing God has for me. I read it again a day or so ago in First Corinthians 2 where Paul is talking about what God has freely given us. Then it dawned on me. This verse was being quoted from Isaiah. This verse is about Jesus.

God is telling the Jews that their minds could not conceive of the gift he would be bringing them, the gift above all gifts, the gift of Jesus' atoning death on a cross. No one could have guessed that this gift would be the murder of God, who had come in the flesh, at their own hands.

This was the gift for those who loved God! This gift was infinitely more loving than merely delivering Israel physically and putting a Jewish man on the throne. No eye could envision scourging God, no ear could feign hearing the curtain rip! How much more loving an action than protecting that curtain!

When I expect God to protect my interests, or even my own self, am I asking for something less loving than what he has for me? My life might be more glorifying to God if he rips me rather than shields me. We must let God rip that which he originally knit together.