I laugh at the recent ad for Copilot (a Microsoft AI technology that assists with work related tasks) that features a young man, presumably new to his workplace, feeling lost in his first meeting with all the acronyms bouncing off the walls like rubber balls. “Learn to speak your company’s language,” the ad says. Of course, Copilot came to the rescue with interpretations so he could appear intelligent in the meeting.

We live in an age where acronyms are the norm, especially in texting.

Sometimes I get a headache trying to figure out what all the capital letters meshed together might mean. I’m from an era when the most common abbreviation in social contexts was RSVP.

The medical field today blasts us with abbreviations. Now, we can read our test results within a few hours using our online medical charts, but only if we can decipher the favored acronyms. I have often asked Copilot, “Can you rephrase this in common English?” To which it happily obeys.

By the time we retire, we’ve probably have been exposed to a dictionary of abbreviated medical terms.

When I was Director of Social Services at a nursing home, before PDFs (Physician’s Desk Reference) and computers, I needed to stay current with the residents’ needs. Their medical charts were handwritten, bound, and kept in a rolling bookcase. No HIPAA laws back then, either.  I read through charts every few days to keep up with orders and residents’ concerns. Even then, acronyms were favored by medical professionals.

I became familiar with the most common ones, like CHF (congestive heart failure) and COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), even those vague diagnoses and made-up ones, such as AAA, not an auto-service, rather MDS shorthand for Affirmities Associated with the Aging. (Back then, doctors liked to make up words.)

I think the most perplexing acronym I came across in those days was GOK. It took me a few days to track down the physician to determine the diagnosis. I finally reached him at his office and asked him what this mysterious illness was. He snickered as he said, “Oh, yeah. That’s one of my favorites … God Only Knows.”

I finally reached him at his office and asked him what this mysterious illness was. He snickered as he said, “Oh, yeah. That’s one of my favorites … God Only Knows.”

I’ve laughed over that through the decades since. Now, as the days ahead are fewer than the days behind, the expression takes on new meaning for me.  With aging comes much uncertainty, as our bodies cave to the onslaught of so many vulnerabilities.

For believers, whether facing medical challenges, financial difficulties, or social transitions that may appear overwhelming, the assurance that God knows, even though we don’t, provides us with abiding comfort.   

Oswald Chambers (1874-1917), the great Scottish evangelist, writes:  

“God does not give us overcoming life. He gives us life as we overcome …

The saint is hilarious when he is crushed with difficulties because the

thing is so ludicrously impossible to anyone but God.”

If you’re like me, waiting for clarity or solutions makes me anxious. This hounding heaven for answers is like saying, “I’d like to know from what I’m going to suffer before I have to suffer it. I want my problem to have an acronym … one I can ask Copilot to interpret for me.”

For only God has infinite knowledge of us, even more than what we know about ourselves.

Jesus understands our need for answers in life’s uncertainties. “ Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.  So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.” Matthew 10:29-31 (NIV)

The fact that the Lord knows the number of hairs on my head, a statistic that changes every day and even several times during the day, makes me pause with joy. If God knows that much about me, He certainly knows what is ahead and will help me through whatever challenges I may face.

If God knows that much about me, He certainly knows what is ahead and will help me through whatever challenges I may face.

We can rest in the knowledge that God is omniscient.

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary defines omniscient as: “1) having infinite awareness, understanding, and insight, and 2) possessing universal awareness and complete knowledge.”

The prophets and New Testament writers tell us of God’s omniscience:

Psalm 139:1-2 (ESV)

“O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
    you discern my thoughts from afar.”

Hebrews 4:13 (ESV)

“And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”

Proverbs 15:3 (ESV)

“The eyes of the Lord are in every place,
keeping watch on the evil and the good.”

1 John 3:19-20 (ESV)

“By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him; for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything.”

Because God Only Knows, we can take the next step unafraid, resting in His omniscience.

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1 My Utmost for His Highest, (Barbour, 1963), 157
2  Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition (Merriam-Webster, Incorporated, 2005) 865