The true crime genre has taken the world by storm. A recent popculture magazine article outlined not simply a “top 10” list, but 60 true crime podcasts that “we’ve been hooked on.” While I have never listened to any of these podcasts personally, I was one of the thousands who, this past fall, became invested in Only Murders in the Building, a mystery-comedy series about three neighbours who start their own podcast covering their investigation of a murder in their affluent Manhattan apartment complex.
This desire to immerse ourselves in crime stories isn’t new. Sherlock Holmes, Miss Marple and Nancy Drew have been popular characters for generations, as have board games such as the Hasbro classic Clue. There is something appealing about these stories, knowing that there will be a satisfying resolution as the crime is solved.
But life is not a crime novel. And neither is our faith.
Biblical studies professor N.T. Wright has observed that deep within all human beings is the knowledge that something is “not right” and that this “not rightness” ought to be fixed. We meditate on what it will take to put things right in the world, what it will take to solve the problems around us—problems such as climate change, racism, poverty and disease.
One of the deeply resonant themes of the Bible is that justice matters to God and should matter to God’s people. It is good that we look at the world around us and recognize that something must be done to set things right again, just as a court judge declares justice for the victim when a crime has been committed.
And yet, in the same breath, another deeply resonant theme of the Bible is that of unsolved mystery. The writer of Ecclesiastes reminds us that “God makes everything happen at the right time. Yet none of us can ever fully understand all he has done, and he puts questions in our minds about the past and the future” (Ecclesiastes 3:11 CEV).
Author and spiritual director Ruth Haley Barton goes so far as to identify “embracing mystery” as a foundation to spiritual transformation. Barton references the biblical metaphors of the formation of an embryo in its mother’s womb and the transformation of a caterpillar in a cocoon, identifying that these natural phenomena are both a physical process and a God-thing with an element of mystery attached to them. When the Apostle Paul uses these metaphors to describe the process of spiritual transformation, he places the process into a space of mystery, something that can only be understood through divine revelation.
In fact, everything Paul affirms as central to our Christian faith is somewhere declared a mystery. In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul writes of the mystery of God (see 1 Corinthians 2:1 CEV) and that we are servants and stewards of God’s mysteries (see 1 Corinthians 4:1). In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul again writes of the mystery of God’s will (see Ephesians 1:9), the mystery of Christ (see Ephesians 3:4), the mystery of the gospel (see Ephesians 6:19), and even the mystery of marriage, which is applied to Christ and the church (see Ephesians 5:31-32).
Mystery can be a difficult thing for us to embrace. We like things that are tangible, understandable, concrete. We like questions with answers, problems with solutions and challenges that can be resolved. And yet, mystery is something that we as Christians must live with. There is much about our faith that is mysterious, that is difficult to explain or understand, and there are many things that God does for which we cannot give an answer.
Barton stresses, “If we are not comfortable with mystery, we are not comfortable with the very gospel we preach. The journey of transformation requires some measure of willingness to relinquish control and give ourselves over to a process that we cannot fully understand, nor can we predict the outcome. We know we will be more like Christ, but we cannot predict exactly what the person of Christ lived in and through us will look like or where it will take us.”
As Christians, we live in the middle of the story, between creation and redemption, waiting for the day when all is made right. Jesus inaugurated the kingdom, but it is not yet fully here. Until then, we live in the tension of an unfolding mystery, trusting God with the unknown.
Captain Laura Van Schaick is the divisional secretary for women’s ministries in the Ontario Division.
Illustration: siraanamwong/stock.Adobe.com
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Thanks, Laura, for your fine piece. It’s difficult to embrace the idea that we don’t (and will never, this side of paradise) know it all. Jesus doesn't promise his disciples that they will master an understanding of themselves or the world around them—let alone God! He does, however, become frustrated when they don’t readily embrace significant ideas like service, justice, and self-sacrifice. Paul teaches that in the present, we find ourselves looking through a mirror obscurely. We know only in part (1 Corinthians 13:12). He contrasts this with the greatest thing we can do: Love. So, let’s not be satisfied with ignorance. Let’s work to learn as much as we can, while also learning to sit with mystery.
P.S. I can’t wait for the second season of Only Murders in the Building.