Pondering the mystery

I’ve always been fascinated by mystery stories. Growing up I read Trixie Belden and Encyclopedia Brown.  I enjoyed trying to figure out what happened as the story unfolded. As an adult, it seems my search for mystery stories leads mostly to murder mysteries.  While  I’m not fond of reading about a character’s demise, the who-done-it clues from the story do get my mind thinking.

It seems that people like mystery stories of many kinds because there are numerous subcategories in the genre. But with all the creative and varied stories that are out there, are we missing the chance to ponder the greatest of all mysteries: God? While we can enter into a personal relationship with Him, that doesn’t mean we know or understand Him completely. For example, take the Trinity; we can do our best to explain it in human terms, but what is it really and how can it be? Have we ever thought about how a simple petition we make is received by the Trinity? We may pray to any one person in the Trinity, but since all are one, do they need to consult one another?

If the topic of the three persons in one God is too overwhelming, how about pondering something more down to earth: Jesus; specifically His incarnation, death and resurrection. It’s very easy to say that since He is God, that’s how He was able to become man, suffer, die and rise again. But if we chalk it all up to His divine nature, are we missing the opportunity to go deeper into His humanity? In my simple brain, I wonder what He was thinking while His body was developing in Mary’s womb; did he know as each organ and body part was being formed? As a child, did He have to be taught how to read and write, or did His divine nature allow Him to bypass those little adventures? And as for His resurrection, how did he know when it was time to rise from the dead?  After all there is no time and space when we die, right? These may seem like trivial questions, but they are human questions — mysteries to consider.

Do we shy away from pondering the mysteries of God because it’s too overwhelming, or is it that we, as humans, will not be able to solve them in this lifetime?


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