Doctrine: Mysteries

Doctrine: Mysteries

Physical and Spiritual Mysteries
The farmer who turns up the ground and sows the seed seldom pauses to reflect on the mystery of its growth. Even the philosopher who understands the wonderful process of vegetation is conscious of difficulties he cannot solve in its several stages toward maturity. The farmer doesn't refuse to sow the seed because he can't see the actual plant in it. A sperm cell is almost invisible, yet it contains the full potential for a perfect human organism. Think of the mystery in such natural phenomena. We accept them because we can't live without them. God hasn't given us the freedom to reject natural laws and mysterious phenomena in connection with our physical lives. But He has chosen to give us the ability to reject His spiritual laws and not immediately feel the consequences. If we refuse to eat we'll die. There are no two ways about it. But in the spiritual realm we feel no immediate physical impact of disobedience to God's laws. There is a spiritual consequence, but those who have no spiritual sensibility or life don't feel it. It would be just like inflicting punishment on a corpse; it couldn't feel it. Just so the spiritually dead can't feel the spiritual consequences of their disobedience. The Great Touches the Mysterious
Parker says: "There is a mystery about religion, but there is ten thousand times more mystery without it. There is mystery with the Bible, but there is nothing but mystery without it. There is a mystery of grace; yes, and there is the mystery of sin. Life is a mystery. All that is great touches the mysterious. In proportion as a thing rises from vulgarity and the commonplace, it rises into wondrousness-and the wondrousness is but the first round in the ladder whose head rests upon the infinite mysteries." No Explanation
Take a hyacinth bulb, for instance. Put it in a glass jar of water and watch it day by day. The leaves and the buds unfold above. The roots develop below. Then as the days get warmer it bursts into full and beautiful bloom. Why should the bulb break out this way into flower, leaf, and root before your eyes? "Why," you might say, "they always do." Yes, but why? You say it is the law of growth; but what do you mean by that? You don't explain anything by merely labeling it. You fail to explain either what it is in itself, or why it should be at work here under these conditions. You can't deny its existence, yet the moment you try to penetrate below the surface it eludes you altogether.