There is no spoon

As you can guess, I am a huge fan of the movie The Matrix. I first saw it in Phoenix, a week or so after its release. I was totally captivated by the spiritual imagery in the movie. I could not even guess how many times I have seen it since.

There are so many lines in the movie that I think are incredible. I am sure that at some point on this site I will refer to many of them. For this post however, I thought I would talk about one that impacts the reality I find myself in now. The above line "There is no spoon," occurs when a child is trying to expand Neo's (the lead character) view of his reality. "There is no spoon." That is where I find myself in many respects.

It all began during my doctoral work in ministry at my former church as I was attempting to initiate a ministry to under 35 adults. (In reality, I guess I started along this vein in the late 80's and early 90's at a ministry location in another state; but I was not aware of the reality of the issues I was seeing.) It was during the research for that doctoral dissertation where I first became fully, consciously aware of the term "postmodernism," without having a negative light shown upon it.

You see, my theological education, up to that point, was almost 100% from a modernist perspective. It was based totally upon enlightenment reasoning. It was all about proof and study and analysis to support the faith. Now, that is not all bad, there is a time for that, and I am not the only one who had that training. In fact, everyone did in the 70's and 80's.

My early ministry, therefore, was based upon that reasoning. It was all about proof and reason. I lived that. Shoot, in my first church once a quarter I would answer Bible and related questions instead of a message. I was sort of a Bible Answer Man, or so I thought. I am stronger and more solid in my faith now than I could even dream of then, but I have fewer answers, and lots more questions!

There is no spoon.

Here is what I think I am learning. In the words of another pastor, most of us want a god that is about 6'8" or so. He is bigger than we are, but we can still get our mind around him. Now I am learning something. God is no 6'8" god that I can comprehend. Neither is He 7'9" or 9'7" or 25'6". He is so much larger than us that we cannot even dream of getting our minds fully around Him. He is so big, that I am not really sure why we use the pronoun "Him" to talk about this Spirit Being who is our God. (Actually, as strange as it sounds, I do have a little understanding about that, and I do not think I am a chauvinist - - - my female friends tell me I truly am not - - - I hope they are not kidding me!)

There is no spoon. Your reality, my reality was all wrong!! Just like the spoon was not real, the god we often create in our mind is not real. That god is created in our image, not vice versa! We create that god from what we have been taught, what we have experienced, etc. It is often mixed with truth, but it is not fully the truth.

The real God is so large (metaphorically) that no one, not me nor you, can get our minds around Him. There are things that I simply do not understand. There are things in my life that in all honesty, I do not think or feel are fair. I do not like them and really want to change it. There are people I care about in my life and in my ministry that have hurts and cares I cannot explain. There are things that happen on the planet (read tsunami, aids, child neglect, abuse, rape, genocide, etc.) that I do not understand.

The old god required me to explain them. Where was God when it hurt? How does God meet me in my pain?

The "no spoon" God does not demand that at all. He says, "I care for you in your suffering. It may be a result of sin over the centuries building up (See, I do understand the theological moorings of the explainable god.) but what really matters is not "why." What matters is "Who." And that "who" is the "no spoon God" who says, "I love you. I care for you. I am with you in your suffering. Allow me to be with you. I loved you and cared so much for you that I died for you, when you could not even die for yourself!"

There is no spoon. How incredibly freeing it is!!