{"id":1016,"date":"2021-09-13T10:07:04","date_gmt":"2021-09-13T14:07:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=1016"},"modified":"2021-09-13T10:07:04","modified_gmt":"2021-09-13T14:07:04","slug":"the-grand-master","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2021\/09\/13\/the-grand-master\/","title":{"rendered":"The Grand Master"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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It seemed that everyone who carried a Nerd Card in my high school \u2013 and I had a Nerd Gold Card \u2013 eventually joined the Chess Club.

I was a capable chess player.  Generally I could whip my friends during lunch before they had a chance to finish their Fritos.

When I joined the Chess Club, however, I found myself for the first time playing opponents who really knew what they were doing.

Chess is an exquisitely complex game.  For instance, there\u2019s an almost limitless number of opening moves that two players can make:  318,979,564,000, to be exact.  With that kind of freedom, you have the distinct impression that you can do anything.<\/em>  You are, after all, the managing director of half the pieces on the board \u2013 16 in all.

But when you\u2019re up against a formidable opponent, it\u2019s surprising how quickly the game can turn.  I am a sufficiently skilled chess player to see ahead about a half dozen moves.  The experienced guys in the Chess Club, however, could see far beyond that.  It was as if they could anticipate everything I was about to do \u2013 long before it even occurred to me.

Which led to moments where one of them might say:  \u201cAbout 11 moves ago, if you had moved your bishop here, things might have gone better for you.\u201d  Uh, thanks<\/em>.

The interesting thing is that I was always free \u2013 free to make any move I wanted.  But they displayed what I would call a higher freedom.  They could see more of the board, and more of what was likely to happen.  And within that larger vision, they almost always made mincemeat of me.  I played right into their hands.

People who endeavor to know God quickly become aware of a spiritual conundrum:  How is it possible for human beings to have free will, yet at the same time God is in charge of Reality?  If God knows everything, and knows where history is leading, doesn\u2019t that completely erase the validity of human choices?

This is where it\u2019s helpful to recognize God as the ultimate Grand Master.  All day today I will be free \u2013 terrifyingly free \u2013 to choose my words, decide my actions, and determine my next steps.  The content of my character and the direction of my life will be hanging in the balance. 

Yet nothing I\u2019m going to do today will surprise God.  That\u2019s because God sees the \u201cplaying field\u201d of my life with absolute clarity.  God won\u2019t take my choices away.  <\/em>But like a brilliant chess strategist who knows where the game is headed, God will fully take my choices into account.<\/em>

This shines some light on one of the more celebrated verses of the New Testament:  \u201cAnd we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who are called according to his purpose\u201d (Romans 8:28). 

That sentence isn\u2019t a declaration that all things are good.  That\u2019s plainly not true.  But God is able and willing to work for the good<\/em> even when my choices (my next moves, so to speak) turn out to be foolish, shortsighted, or even disastrous.

The enduring takeaway from my Chess Club is that when we dare to compete with better players, we quickly learn the limits of our own abilities.

When we turn our hearts to the heart of God, we quickly learn that he has no limits at all.

No wonder he\u2019s called the King.
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It seemed that everyone who carried a Nerd Card in my high school \u2013 and I had a Nerd Gold Card \u2013 eventually joined the Chess Club. I was a capable chess player.  Generally I could whip my friends during lunch before they had a chance to finish their Fritos. When I joined the Chess Club, however, I found myself… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1017,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[307],"class_list":["post-1016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-free-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1016"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1018,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions\/1018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}