PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

"God moves in a mysterious way / His wonders to perform . . ."  That is not from the Scripture; it is from a poem by William Cowper; and like anything else written by a poet, or by someone who presumes to be a poet, it carries no theological or doctrinal authority.

  I suggest that God, through His Son Jesus Christ, has created, and operates, the Cosmos openly; and that the mystery is not an aspect of His personality, as He disclosed it through Jesus (cf. John 14:8-11), but is, instead, an effect of our spiritual ignorance and immaturity.  I will cite three examples.

   At the moment, I am suffering from a massive bacterial infection that has threatened the function of some of my abdominal organs.  An antibiotic has been prescribed, and is working well (Sunday night was one of the most excruciating sessions of pain I have ever experienced, but the prescription had not yet been filled then).  I do not have a clue how the antibiotic works on the infection; but my Doctor knows, and is even prepared well enough to offer a back-up if the infection resurges.  The activity of the antibiotic (which, as I understand it now in my limited way) ruptures the cell wall of each bacterium, so that its guts and vital fluids leak out.  Neat.  Still mysterious to me, but not to my physician.

    When I was, say, in elementary school, the operation of an automobile was mysterious to me; especially one with a manual transmission.  This does not mean the vehicle was mysterious to those who had done their prep, and, once I attained the age of sixteen, I was allowed to take a course in high school on how to operate a vehicle.  Seven years after that, my then job, in the maintenance of road markings and signage on county roads, required me to learn how to drive a "stick."  I remember the Friday when my father, who was my supervisor's supervisor's supervisor, ordered my immediate supervisor to take me out to the most rural roads of the county, and teach me how to drive a pick up truck with a stick.  After a lot of explanation, and much practice, I became quite proficient, to the point I could shift gears on an upward slope, which some of my peers found intimidating.  The mystery of vehicle operation, especially of a stick, was essentially gone.  It had not been built into the vehicle by the manufacturer, or by the government entity for which I worked, but was an effect of my lack of experience.  Once the prep was done, I was tooling along.

   When I was a freshman in college, certain seniors, who needed to put someone down in order to feel validared, asked freshmen what they would, after four years, write their Senior Papers on.  The Senior Paper, in the liberal arts departments (I do not know what the Science required; in the school of Music, it was an individual concert on one's chosen instrument) was very mysteriou---how long? footnoted? subject selected or directed?  What was the ominous sounding defense of the paper before the rest of the class?  Was the oral exam, before a committee of degreed scholars (and required to attain the degree) based upon the Senior Paper?  The College of Liberal Arts did not conceal the details; I simply did not know who, and did not have the courage, to ask at that time.  Plenty oif Seniors, any professor, and definitely my faculty advisor would have gladly explained the process.  Mention of it would occur in certain classes, where we were reminded to keep something in mind for our Senior Papers.  (For the record, I wrote mine on the historical philosophy of the first Christian who was a professional---that is, scholarly---historian, Eusebius of Caesarea; and, rather than have one person selected to attack the paper, or raise objective criticisms against it, I asked for all nine of the senior class members in that department to attack my paper; and our instructor deemed my defense worthy of an A+,  I learned, in the most dramatic way during that term, not only to do my prep, but to do it thoroughly, and to recheck it before the last minute.  As for the oral examination, that was on any question the committee chose to ask.)

   What appears to us as a mysery is not a deliberate failure of disclosure on God's behalf, but our spiritual, even if unintentional, immaturity---just as I did not know, in fourth grade, how to drive a car; and I did not know during my freshman year what would be required of my Senior Paper; and I am still not entirely sure I can describe the operation of that busy antibiotic as it continues to battle and eradicate my internal infection.

    Christ, or Jesus, to Whom I will refer for the remainder of this does not operate the Cosmos by chance or by a happy accident.  As Colossians 1:17 tells us, "by Him, all things consist," and if He is the consistence of the Cosmos, you can rely to your last breath that He not only knows how it works, but it not overtaken by surprise or by the unexpected.  When those two naked people in the Garden failed Him, He came personally to inquire (because, as Genesis tells us, He liked to walk around His Garden---it was His, not theirs---in the evening cool; doesn't that just sound like Jesus), and the decision of the consequence of their stupidity was clearly and openly stated, not from a Throne in Heaven, but in a face to face discussion in which He demonstrated, as He does in the Gospels, tremendous courtesy to those who had stumbled).

    Romans 8:28 tells us that all things worked together for the good of those who love God and who are called according to His purpose.  While the late summer has removed from me some of my Calvinist views---as I contemplate a return to my high church Lutheran practice (thank you, Countess D"Agoult)---I do believe that all Christians have been called according to His purpose; therefore, all things, not some things, not some of the time, not if only the right conditions obtain, and not if Grandad MoonShiner's corns don't ache . . . but all things, all the time, all in perfect synchronization work for the good of those who love God and who have been called according to His purpose.

     Let us consider the account of Jacob's son, Joseph, in Genesis.  His brother, a bunch of jealous clodhoppers who resented his coat of many colors, abducted him and sold him into slavery to merchants who then resold him in Egypt.  That was a dastardly act of cowardice, contempt, and disrespect (and I experienced that last year when a friend on whom I had counted betrayed me . . . while I layed in a hospital facility praying to stay alive).  Christ allowed that act of perfidy to bring Joseph to a position of power from which he could protect his family, and the entire nation of Egypt, from famine.  (After all, the outlines of this had been disclosed to Abraham two generations before.)  No chance operating; no failure to plan . . .  not on Jesus' part.  The betrayal that attacked me at my most weakest condition last year was, in fact, a blessing, as it revealed to me that a friend of whom I had been fond understood friendship only as long as we remained in agreement, only as long as this supposed friend had a blank check to make untoward and discourteous remarks,

   Perhaps the most telling Scripture is in Ephesians 2;10, where we are called Christ's workmanship or, to use the literal word (which I wish the King James translators had retained) His Poiesis, or His Poetry.  Did you know Christ was a Poet, and we who are His are His poems?  And I think the stars are His poems; and the hydrogen atoms; and everything in the Cosmos in between.  Conteporary poets today seem to think we should dispense with form, meter, rhyme, and just sling words together in a slog because "that's more honest."  In the womb, we are formed according to a precise pattern carried on forty-six chromosomes, and that plan is not deviated unless an unfortunate mutation occurs.  We expect human beings to have bodies that follow a specific pattern:  my heart, liver, and my enormous gut are exactly where yours, and everyone else's are.  I will concede that some of the poets I have met seem to have their brains in their assholes, but even that, like Joseph's brother, can be compelled to serve the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.  Those same formal patterns of Christ's Poiesis keep the stars from disintegrating:  the upward pressure of hyrdrogen fusion is balanced against the downward pressure of the gravity of mass, so that the star's body is held in discrete equilibrium; and it can even be formulated mathematically.  I do not understand that equation, but Christ did not hide it in mystery; astronomers understand it quite well, and are not stupefied by it.

  I do not believe the Cosmos operates by merry accident, or by chance collisions, or by anything else on which we blame our troubles.  Christ did not just throw His Poiesis together because He had something He needed to get off his chest.  In the carpenter shop in Nazareth, He did not build random piles of wood that he just gathered together and dumped out as a finished project:  He used a level, a plumb, a straight-edge, and He probably worked from plans, either drawn or memorized.  Imagine going to a surgeon who tells you, "Nope, I didn't bother with all that schoolin', who needs all them textbooks, I just felt like I needed to heal, and I got this handy switch blade down at my local gun and knife show, so just let me slice you open, so I can get that problem off your chest."  Not the way to write a poem; not the way to administer the Cosmos.  I think Jesus Christ, the Regnant Lord, understands that---and, in His plan before the foundation of the world, set it up for us . . . because He wants it that way, and expects us to do our prep.

Starward