Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Devotion - Tuesday, February 28

My reading continued into I Corinthians 1. Today it was verses 20-31. Paul continues to speak of the "folly" or "foolishness" of the Gospel.

G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936) writes in Orthodoxy, "Mysticism keeps men (sic) sane. As long as you have mystery you have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity." The mystery which lies at the center of the Gospel story keeps us sane; it aligns us with God's wonderfully mysterious ways. When we deny mystery, the incarnation as well as the resurrection become unfathomable.

This is not a denial of intellectual inquiry. But it is a reminder that the wisdom of which Paul writes in I Corinthians 1 is not the same as accumulated knowledge.

Returning to Chesterton, he writes, "The ordinary man (sic) has always been sane because the ordinary man has always been a mystic. He has permitted the twilight. He has one foot on earth and the other in fairyland. He has always left himself free to doubt his gods; but (unlike the agnostic of to-day) free also to believe in them. He has cared more for truth than for consistency. If he saw two truths that seemed to contradict each other, he would take the two truths and the contradiction along with them."

We should never mis-hear the Gospel's talk of "true wisdom" and think it is telling us to forsake our academic pursuits. Nothing could be more wrong. We should hear in the Gospel story an invitation to seek not only the things physical, but also those things which are mystical. Who can explain the attraction which is expressed as love? How can you make sense of an undying allegiance to Tigers (particularly when placed opposite a Gamecock)? My belief in God is as solid as the chair upon which I am sitting, but it is as mysterious as the scent arising from my morning coffee.

"We preach Christ crucified." Folly to a great many others. But for us it is the power of God made real and manifested in our lives.

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