“God's Nature is incomprehensible to men.”

What is Man?
He little more than a mote--
a short gasp of air while he lives.
Soon he grows old and withers,
his mind fails –
his body returns to dust.

Oh man, mortal and frail and weak,
who are you that God takes note of you?
That God grooms the paths you trod,
tends the earth you set foot upon.
How can you conceive of God, oh man,
when you life ends faster than a mug of tea cools –
What hubris to think the mind of man in his clay shell,
could ponder of the wonders of the everlasting God.
The work of our hands lasts but a generation,
two at best.
And if we are so lucky as to forge something that lasts longer,
all thought of us disappears, even if the craft remains.
Who can name a builder of the pyramids,
Or what child cares for the fashioner of the great wall?
In our generation we make paper instead of stone,
And clouds instead of mortar.
What have we that lasts?
Nothing but our faith.

Yet our God laid the foundations of the earth.
He set the planets on their courses.
Our God devised laws that would dictate the movements even of tiny particles,
while our own human laws are broken daily.
Oh God, have mercy upon your people,
We are as the leaves that fall,
colored red with embarrassment at our errors,
yet your way last forever.

How can we understand your perfection,
when we are so broken?
How can we understand your love,
when we are so temperamental?
How can we understand your eternality,
when we are so short lived?

Oh God, have mercy on us,
show us your face that we might ponder the mystery of your nature.

Further Reading: Psalm 90