During the teaching portion of a church service I recently attended, the speaker said something which has not left me. He confessed that a large part of the motivation behind his theological pursuits was to know everything about God. To his surprise, he found that the more he learned, the more he realized he did not, and could not, know.
This has been my experience as well when it comes to the knowledge of God. Though I would never have admitted it, part of me always imagined a ceiling, albeit a high one, that could be approached through study. I might even have been confused enough to believe that after studying, I could say that the distance between me and this ceiling was less than before. But quite a different thing happens when learning about God.
As the mind is exercised, its ability is strengthened. For one thing, it becomes more skilled at understanding. Therefore someone for whom studying is a habit will likely take in information more easily than someone who is less practiced at it. This is not a groundbreaking concept. What is more interesting is how humanity has a unique ability to see into the unknown; not necessarily in such a way that it is comprehended, but most definitely so as to grasp its gravity, and by contrast, our ignobility. While studying geology, one might discover the domain of seismology, and be overcome with a curiosity for it before knowing much about it. Likewise, it is a most attractive irony that every truth God allows us to discover about Himself is accompanied with a much more substantial notion of His greatness which remains to be explored, so that the joy of drawing near to Him through spiritual exercise expands the confines of the imagination exponentially, always leaving more of God to enjoy.
This is why, after two thousand years of Christian thought, still no student of the Bible would dare say, “Everything has been expounded.” No matter how many ‘Systematic Theology’ textbooks are published, the vastness of Scripture does not become less. If anything, it dwarfs man increasingly. Again, with nature, no amount of scientific discovery will ever exalt creation above the Creator. If anything, new complexities found in nature reveal new aspects of His greatness. So it is very important not to presume that there is an end to reach.
G.K. Chesterton makes this observation in ‘Orthodoxy’:
“The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits.”
This truth is a gift, and it must be seen as a gift lest we become more like the logician than the poet. To participate in God’s goodness by crediting all good things to Him is a humble desire, whereas pride seeks to possess goodness intellectually in order to claim some ownership of it. In so doing, the proud man will never be at rest, because he wants infinitely more than he has the capacity to understand.
Mankind marvels at infinity. We long for new heights more for the sake of the measurement than what is being measured. That is why if someone manages to attach 110 clothespins to their face, breaking the current record of 104, it will be a feat worthy of thousands of YouTube views.
Not, of course, because this activity has any real purpose or value, but because record-breaking somehow satisfies our instinctive thirst for getting further than ever before, even if it is in a very frivolous pursuit. Yet to take pleasure in milestones of greatness, it must be granted that there is no maximum, for as soon as a limit is reached, the joy of going beyond vanishes.
In the gospel of John, as Jesus’ ministry begins, that of John the Baptist falls into obscurity. John himself, referring to Jesus, states in chapter 3 that “He must increase, but I must decrease. (John 3:30)” However, there is no indication that this “decrease” is a willful exit on his part. On the contrary, John continued baptizing at the same time as Jesus’ disciples, presumably until his imprisonment. The decrease John underwent was, in fact, a relative one. His purpose was to point to the Messiah, and his ministry was destined to be eclipsed by that of Jesus. This was not because John’s would actually become less, but because Jesus’ would become so much more.
At a wedding, a proper MC keeps the focus on the subject of the occasion, namely, the newly weds. To place the spotlight upon himself/herself would be of poor taste and distract from the real celebration. Likewise, John understood the supremacy of the Lord’s coming, saying:
“The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease. (John 3:29-30)”
In one’s devotion to God, this pattern cannot be escaped. If the thrill of an object is in its discovery, to get to the end of it would be a great loss. With God, we may cling intimately to all that we know of Him while gazing longingly into the immeasurable expanse of what we do not, knowing that He has granted us full access to Himself through the sacrifice of His Son. Our knowledge of God humbles us as it increases, and this humility is the decrease of self-exaltation we are called to as we study and meditate on God’s Word.