{"id":50,"date":"2012-04-25T08:50:12","date_gmt":"2012-04-25T08:50:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/meditations.kafkasworld.com\/dir\/?p=50"},"modified":"2012-04-25T08:50:12","modified_gmt":"2012-04-25T08:50:12","slug":"dealing-with-mystery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2012\/04\/25\/dealing-with-mystery\/","title":{"rendered":"Dealing with Mystery"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n
Dealing with Mystery
\nCopyright by Shea Oakley
\nAll rights reserved.<\/p>\n

The famous Christian author John Bunyon once wrote the following:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe mysteries and contradictions which the Christian revelation leaves unsolved are made tolerable by hope.”<\/p>\n

No one who has read the Bible with an open mind can honestly say that they have never been perplexed by it. While some might condemn the author of The Pilgrim\u2019s Progress for using the term \u201ccontradictions\u201d rather than something like \u201cparadoxes\u201d honest believers will admit that certain things in Scripture do at least appear contradictory.<\/p>\n

The thinking Christian must wrestle with these seeming contradictions. Some might say that the problem is intellectual conceit, that the Word of God is completely understandable to anyone who has the simple, childlike faith which Jesus commended in the Gospels. Such a statement may be partially true but it must be remembered that He also re-enforced the first and greatest commandment telling us to \u201cLove the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with ALL YOUR MIND and with all your strength” (Mk. 12:30). Checking our intellect at the church door is not an option. Bunyan knew this.<\/p>\n

Yet, despite this, it could be suggested that even a great saint like Bunyan might just as well have spoken of \u201cmysteries\u201d and left it at that. The word \u201cmystery\u201d is a lot softer than \u201ccontradiction\u201d and perhaps more accurate as well. It implies that some Scripture speaks of realities which are absolutely true but also absolutely beyond the realm of human intellect. All knowledge of God is limited by our current condition and is seen, as the apostle Paul put it, \u201cthrough a glass darkly\u201d (1st Co. 13:12). It is impossible to tie up every seemingly loose end in the Bible, at least with the fallen minds we currently possess. Some things are simply too great for us to know, at least for now.<\/p>\n

One key to balancing our questionings with the inerrant nature of God\u2019s Word is humility, a conscious trust that the God of the Universe knows what He is doing. Becoming humble means we no longer presume to place Him, as C.S. Lewis put it, “in the dock”, meaning in the role of a defendant in court. Those who write off the Bible as untrue usually do so more out of personal arrogance than because of honest inquiry. If someone is offended by the message of the cross one of the easiest ways to respond is by using that old stand-by, \u2018The Bible contradicts itself\u2019.<\/p>\n

The other key truly is, as Bunyan states, hope. Throughout the life of a believer God sends what someone once described as \u201cpostcards from Heaven\u201d. These are sublime glimpses of how all reality is ultimately summed up in the Person of Jesus Christ. Such epiphanies give us the precious hope that everything will make sense in the end on all levels, including the intellectual.<\/p>\n

Such hope, indeed, makes everything \u201ctolerable\u201d and sometimes, blessedly, does far more than that.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dealing with Mystery Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved. The famous Christian author John Bunyon once wrote the following: \u201cThe mysteries and contradictions which the Christian revelation leaves unsolved are made tolerable by hope.” No one who has read the Bible with an open mind can honestly say that they have never been perplexed… <\/p>\n

Read more Dealing with Mystery<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-christian","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6GkOA-O","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1298,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2018\/05\/31\/1298\/","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":0},"title":"Biblical \u201cContradiction\u201d and Divine Paradox","date":"May 31, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright\u00a0 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved \u201cThe various elements of truth stand in perpetual antithesis sometimes requiring us to believe apparent opposites while we wait for the moment when we shall know as we are known. Then truth which now appears to be in conflict with itself will arise\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1240,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2018\/03\/21\/free-will-determinism-and-a-possibly-divine-paradox\/","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":1},"title":"Free Will, Determinism, and a (Possibly) Divine Paradox","date":"March 21, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2018 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved The God who created the Universe is a determining Being with a determinate character. It is from this fixed, eternal, and perfect character that He decides what is and what is not, what will be and what will never be, the existence\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1278,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2018\/05\/11\/fear-and-the-demonization-of-christian-psychology\/","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":2},"title":"Fear and the Demonization of Christian Psychology","date":"May 11, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved There are some conservative Christians who have made a crusade out of attacking the rapidly growing Christian counseling movement. They particularly target ministries which they believe have succumbed to the wiles of \u201csecular psychology\u201d. For certain Christians who lean towards the fundamentalist end\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":528,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2014\/06\/13\/when-it-is-wrong-to-be-nice\/","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":3},"title":"When it is Wrong to be Nice","date":"June 13, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved \u201cIt is easy to be nice, even to an enemy-from lack of character.\u201d -Dag Hammarskjold Christians are called to love their enemies. For fallen human beings this is one of the hardest messages Jesus preached. The old man\u2019s desire is to do anything\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":354,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2013\/01\/30\/false-comfort-and-unnecessary-misery\/","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":4},"title":"False Comfort and Unnecessary Misery","date":"January 30, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"False Comfort and Unnecessary Misery Copyright 2013 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved Save us, oh Lord, from false comfort, but also from unnecessary misery for neither is of You. These are two experiences in the Christian life that are opposite states of feeling and yet have perhaps equally deleterious\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":601,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2014\/12\/12\/mortality-and-how-we-distract-ourselves-from-dealing-with-it\/","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":5},"title":"Mortality, and How We Distract Ourselves From Dealing With It…","date":"December 12, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright by Shea Oakley. All rights reserved There has probably never been a time or place in human history when and where it has been so easy to ignore questions of eternal existence as it is now in the West. Today we have so many temporal diversions offering every kind\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}