The Anticipation of Mysteries Revealed

As I've grown a little older and a little wiser, I've come to realize that it was the anticipation of opening a Christmas gift that I enjoyed, even more so than actually opening the gift. I remember when I was a kid, the exciting anticipation leading up to the opening of the gifts, yet sometimes being left disappointed by the gifts themselves. Not that I was a spoiled brat, but it's sad to get a sweater when you've been dreaming of a Lego castle or remote-controlled car for weeks. Now, the point I'm trying to make is not about Christmas specifically, but about the anticipation of a mystery revealed, in general.

This culture is one of instant gratification and materialist explanations. It becomes hard to maintain a sense of wonder when placed in these conditions. I will start with the problems arising from instant gratification (though they may be obvious)...

Whether it's fastfood, 24-hour convenience stores, ATMs, or high-speed internet; when we want something, we want it now. It's kind of humorous and ironic when we reflect on how crazy this is in regards to consumerism, but it isn't a laughing matter when it comes to relationships. This culture of instant gratification, along with the exploitation of women, has created a huge problem in relationships between men and women.

Everywhere we turn there are advertisements which exploit men's sexual desires and women's beauty in order to sell products. As a result, men have come to think of women's sexuality as a commodity that can be bought or sold. Men have such easy access to sex or sexually explicit material that when they come across a woman who plays 'hard-to-get', they run away. The woman wants to get to know the man first (she just wants him to make the effort to get to know her), but the man doesn't have the patience to know the women emotionally, mentally, and spiritually before knowing her physically... And just like everything else, if a man wants sex, he has the right to have it right now. It's become so much the norm that people look at you strangely if you tell them you are waiting for marriage to have sex; "why would you wait for anything, if you can have it right now?" is the mentality.

My intention is not to highlight the current situation in male-female relationships, but to show that we have lost something by being surrounded by instant gratification. We lose the ability to wait for the things we really desire; we lose the ability to work through struggles in relationships (we abandon them instead); and we lose the joy that comes from the combination of anticipation and perserverance (...and many other problems arise from these like losing the ability to trust other people, etc.). I think these things ultimately result in the inability to appreciate the wonder in relationships.

Now I would like to talk about the problems arising from materialistic explanations...

My intention is not to imply that science is evil or contrary to faith because I think science is good and necessary. However, I do think there is a problem with presupposing materialistic explanations for everything. I would like to believe that there exist things outside of human understanding. If we suppose we can explain everything in materialistic terms, I think we strip 'the story' of its 'magic'. For example, when a child is told that there is no Santa Claus, and in fact the presents are placed under the tree by mom and dad, this is mindshattering. My objection isn't towards freeing the child from his/her ignorance, but that someone would do this to the child to strip him/her of a sense of wonder.

This is where the story can be applied to my life. It doesn't bother me that there are materialistic explanations to the phenomena of this world (and beyond), but what does bother me is that people would simply endorse these views in hopes of shattering the sense of wonder I have of God. There is no shame in leaving some things mysterious. Actually, I think it's more beneficial to leave some things as mysteries. There is a sense of wonder instilled in us when we are waiting in eager anticipation of a mystery yet to be revealed. The sense of wonder doesn't come from the revealing, but from the anticipation.

Enough said for now... I leave you with this quote from Albert Einstein...

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."

Chasing Wonder

Somewhere in the transition from childhood to manhood I've lost something fundamental to who I am. I'm a believer in God, but I've seen the wonder slowly slip away. Somewhere along my journey I made an unconscious decision to set aside my heart and focus on the broadening of my intellect. This blog is an attempt to remedy this...

So here I stand, on the most important day of the Christian calendar, Easter, contemplating my relationship to the one Almighty God; Creator, Redeemer, & Sustainer of all. Without this day there is no divine Jesus Christ, and therefore, no "Christianity". There is something about this day that sparks a sense of wonder in me; a sense of wonder that has almost completely dissolved. The wonder a young boy has when he sees his first rainbow, or is startled by the sound of thunder, or feels his heart flutter from the glance of a girl.

Now, I don't want you to think that I've lost my faith in God because that isn't the case. How could I deny the existence of a God I've experienced? It's more of a struggle in relationship, than in belief. When I have a fight with my parents I don't stop believing in them, I just have a hard time seeing eye-to-eye... and so it is with my relationship with God.

The thought of God used to invoke in me a healthy fear, a passion, a curiousity, a desire to stretch beyond myself, a desire to be holy, God was my focus and my motivator. However, somewhere in my path to adulthood I have come to see God more as a puzzle with no solution. This is where the logician in me starts his journey towards insanity. In the words of G.K. Chesterton...

"The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits."

The poet understands something that the logician fails to recognize; that God is something to be imagined, but not understood (at least in fullness). There is no materialist explanation of God's grace, no formula for his love, and no Freudian-psychology that can unravel the depth of His character. The poet takes comfort in this, while the logician shudders at the thought of something which is infinite and incomprehensible.

It is to this end that I seek to suppress the logician and reveal the poet. I want to see the wonder of God for what it is, and not for what I can explain it to be. I don't wish to shed my adulthood, and return to childhood; but I wish to be an adult who maintains a wonder for God. I want there to be a balance between the mind and the heart; between thought and emotion; between logic and poetry.

Part of my struggle is with the Church. There seems to be a dichotomy in what it is, and what it is intended to be. It's the frustration of getting advice when what you need is a shoulder to cry on, or having people present shadows of themselves to each other in the attempt to falsely exemplify the incarnate. I don't think God intended us to be spirits, awkwardly defiant of our bodies; but complete humans (body & spirit) motivated & empowered by the work of God's spirit.

If I'm going to have an impact on the Church, I need to be inspired by God, and this requires a wonder of God. There needs to be an understanding that God is the 'perpetual novelty' (as Ravi Zacharias would say). Not to say that God is new and different everyday, but rather there is never a shortage of things to learn or wonder about God. I leave you with another quote from G.K. Chesterton...

"One of the deepest and strangest of all human moods is the mood which will suddenly strike us perhaps in a garden at night, or deep in sloping meadows, the feeling that every flower and leaf has just uttered something stupendously direct and important, and that we have by a prodigy of imbecility not heard or understood it. There is a certain poetic value, and that a genuine one, in this sense of having missed the full meaning of things. There is beauty, not only in wisdom, but in this dazed and dramatic ignorance."