Lectio
“Wondering is the simple capacity to behold the world around you (and within you), to be awed by its mystery, to be made curious by its difference, and to marvel at its compelling form.”
— Serene Jones, Trauma and Grace: Theology in a Ruptured World
Meditatio
We spend so much time attempting to figure everything out — to know, to understand, and to be certain — that we have lost our ability to wonder, to be in awe, and to experience the mysterious beauty of this strange, tragic, joyful existence of ours.
There is so much that cannot be explained, and that makes us uneasy. It makes us feel inadequate and insecure.
When we stop long enough to admit that we don’t know, can’t know, and may never know — with any kind of reliable certainty — the hows, whys, and whats of the universe, or even our own lives, we are crushed by the sheer magnitude of our ignorance and our insignificance. (Job 38:4)
And yet we long to understand. We have a deep yearning to know it all, to figure it all out, and to connect all of the dots. We grasp for and cling to every little bit of perceived certainty we can, as if knowledge will prevent pain, avert disaster, or fend off tragedy — as if understanding will help us prepare for or mitigate the things that sideswipe us, knock us off our feet, and take our breath away.
We look back at our past for patterns that will help us predict our future. We convince ourselves, for better or worse, that our present circumstances are permanent — as if our minds, bound by time, space, and experience, can grasp eternity or infinity. We believe the lie that there is any time other than now — the perpetually unfolding now — and that the tomorrow that will never come is somehow promised to us. (James 4:14)
All of this, just so that we don’t have to admit that we don’t know. That we can’t know. That it is not for us to know.
And so we fail to wonder. We fail to be in awe. We fail to allow the great mystery that is all of this — whatever this is — to unfold before us, in us, and as us.
We insist on trying to apprehend it, control it, and manipulate it, instead of simply being it.
But what if we stopped long enough to realize that the part of us that demands to know, that refuses to wonder, and that insists on understanding, is not the deepest, truest, or most eternal part of who we are? What if we stopped long enough to be quiet, to simply listen, and to just watch all of it unfold — including our own thoughts? We might begin to realize that the deepest, truest, and most eternal part of who we are is a witness to all of this madness — and that what does the witnessing is not the grasping, narrating self we mistake ourselves for, but something older, quieter, and more spacious. Meister Eckhart called it the ground — that place in the soul where neither time, nor space, nor any created thing can touch. And he insisted that this ground is not reached by adding anything, but only by subtraction — by the slow releasing of everything we have mistakenly believed ourselves to be, until what remains is the glory already waiting within us (Colossians 1:27)
It requires no certainty because it exists outside of — or beneath — all that is uncertain. It demands no understanding because it abides where everything is understood. It does not fight for control because it neither needs nor wants for anything.
This deepest, truest, and most eternal part of who we are is as different from who our minds imagine ourselves to be as our minds are from all that they see, hear, touch, taste, and smell. To this self — the one who witnesses all of reality without grasping at any of it — all of reality, including our own thoughts, is other, just as this deepest part of who we are is other to the world and to our very thoughts.
But when we let go of our need to apprehend, our insistence on understanding, and our desire for control, we begin to witness life as divine mystery, to be in awe of all that is and all that is not, and to live in joyful communion with the time and space that are perpetually unfolding in a never-ending cycle of birth, death, and rebirth — out of and upon the very eternity that is never born, never dies, and has no need to be reborn. (Romans 8:38–39)
As our grip loosens, our very selves slip away, and what remains is life itself — awesome, wondrous, and mysterious life itself.
Oratio
the part of me
that wants to know
is not the me
that can know at all
the part of me
that wants at all
cannot know
for all of its wanting
for in the wanting
what can be known
is lost
hidden behind desire
desire blinds
desire binds
desire distracts me
from love’s unfolding
Contemplatio
What would it mean for you to stop trying to figure it all out — and simply let the mystery unfold?
Related Scripture
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.”
— Job 38:4
For Further Reading
If you enjoyed this post, you may also like The Empty Cup: Emptiness and Receptivity in Christ, which explores the same invitation to release our grasping — tracing the kenotic pattern of self-emptying as the posture through which we become open to receive what God desires to give.
~Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity.
Wrestling With God.
Returning To Love.
Leave a Reply