The Sacredness of Questioning
Dear Eugene,
Yesterday I had a long breakfast conversation with a friend.
Like many, instead of seeing the sacredness of questioning, she mistakes human's searching, a heart's yearning, for disloyalty to tradition and betrayal to her community, social expectations she has long suffered from but couldn't see a reason, wouldn't have the courage to stop their self-perpetuation.
Since I shared the Gospel with her a while back, she started to ask questions. Yesterday's breakfast was about looking for answers together. Searching for food that satisfies.
She said she couldn't accept the idea of God becoming a man, becoming the man that is Jesus. I said I share her doubt wholeheartedly. The day I stop to bewilder over it is the day I cease "to wonder like a little child, to find mystery in everything, every day, everywhere, to be surprised continually, to clap one's hands in glee as every brilliant hour flashes past."
Jesus' incarnation is an idea so ludicrous that it challenges human to the sacred duty of questioning everything, especially our most deep-seated way to understand and approach life, tyranny that we suffer under but still lay our homage of loyalty and devotion at its feet day after day, generation after generation. You can doubt, even scream and shout, but only furtively in your heart or futilely on social media.
My friend called it "fate." A big wheel that keeps on turning and devours anyone, anything that stands in its path. The chief end of man is to take control of its steering, however much we can, to our advantage, be nice to things and people only if you can afford to. The wheel often has a mind of its own anyway; it's not really up to us to be beneficent, even if it's a good head-concept.
Payam Akhavan said in a CBC Massey Lecture, "The problem with the world is not a shortage of brilliant theories or feel-good slogans. The problem is that we confuse proliferation of progressive terminology with empathy and engagement. We say the right things, but we fail to act on them because we want to feel virtuous without paying a price. There can be no meaningful change if we choose to look down at the arena of anguish from thirty thousand feet."
Incarnation. Emmanuel, God with us. The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. Our neighborhood. Suffered with us, right from the get go, for us, unto his death. Yet the world didn’t even notice. He came to his own people, (even when) they didn’t want him. His unrelenting thirty-thousand-feet plunge into humanity is an idea so ludicrous that it challenges us to question everything.
We scarce can take it in. We would rather stick to brilliant theories or feel-good slogans, to proliferate progressive terminology, ivory-tower theology, instead of paying the price to take the plunge with him. He summons us to die with him so that we can truly live. For once. Forever.
"A Christian," I told my friend, "is someone who can never get used to our bewilderment over--not a set of right ideas--but Rightness himself. We can pretend to really really believe in some good ideas by waving our finger and preaching them, even as we have no intention to move an inch in our stubbornness. But we can't pretend to love someone if we don't. Jesus our Lover wouldn't allow it."
Merry (almost) Christmas, Alex
Yesterday I had a long breakfast conversation with a friend.
Like many, instead of seeing the sacredness of questioning, she mistakes human's searching, a heart's yearning, for disloyalty to tradition and betrayal to her community, social expectations she has long suffered from but couldn't see a reason, wouldn't have the courage to stop their self-perpetuation.
Since I shared the Gospel with her a while back, she started to ask questions. Yesterday's breakfast was about looking for answers together. Searching for food that satisfies.
She said she couldn't accept the idea of God becoming a man, becoming the man that is Jesus. I said I share her doubt wholeheartedly. The day I stop to bewilder over it is the day I cease "to wonder like a little child, to find mystery in everything, every day, everywhere, to be surprised continually, to clap one's hands in glee as every brilliant hour flashes past."
Jesus' incarnation is an idea so ludicrous that it challenges human to the sacred duty of questioning everything, especially our most deep-seated way to understand and approach life, tyranny that we suffer under but still lay our homage of loyalty and devotion at its feet day after day, generation after generation. You can doubt, even scream and shout, but only furtively in your heart or futilely on social media.
My friend called it "fate." A big wheel that keeps on turning and devours anyone, anything that stands in its path. The chief end of man is to take control of its steering, however much we can, to our advantage, be nice to things and people only if you can afford to. The wheel often has a mind of its own anyway; it's not really up to us to be beneficent, even if it's a good head-concept.
Payam Akhavan said in a CBC Massey Lecture, "The problem with the world is not a shortage of brilliant theories or feel-good slogans. The problem is that we confuse proliferation of progressive terminology with empathy and engagement. We say the right things, but we fail to act on them because we want to feel virtuous without paying a price. There can be no meaningful change if we choose to look down at the arena of anguish from thirty thousand feet."
Incarnation. Emmanuel, God with us. The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. Our neighborhood. Suffered with us, right from the get go, for us, unto his death. Yet the world didn’t even notice. He came to his own people, (even when) they didn’t want him. His unrelenting thirty-thousand-feet plunge into humanity is an idea so ludicrous that it challenges us to question everything.
We scarce can take it in. We would rather stick to brilliant theories or feel-good slogans, to proliferate progressive terminology, ivory-tower theology, instead of paying the price to take the plunge with him. He summons us to die with him so that we can truly live. For once. Forever.
"A Christian," I told my friend, "is someone who can never get used to our bewilderment over--not a set of right ideas--but Rightness himself. We can pretend to really really believe in some good ideas by waving our finger and preaching them, even as we have no intention to move an inch in our stubbornness. But we can't pretend to love someone if we don't. Jesus our Lover wouldn't allow it."
Merry (almost) Christmas, Alex
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