My friend Charlie always talks about a tension he feels when he approaches the subject of God. He says there are two ways to go about it, and he never knows which one to take. On the one hand you can approach God from an intellectual approach. God can read about, and metaphysically evaluated. A person can interact with the philosophy of God, the history of Religion, analyze Sacred literature, or any number of countless intellectual pursuits surrounding this person or energy or force we call God. On the other hand however there is the path of the mystic who peruses communion with God; who instead of trying to understand what and who God is simply desires to be a part of it.
This is a tension I feel every day at seminary. From the intellectual point of view I am in an academic institution. My methodology operates within the parameters logic and reason. The leap of faith is something that is discouraged in my studies and personal experience is something that is seen as an unfortunate factor that should be minimized as much as possible to achieve the most objective results. The mystic within me is repulsed by these sentiments. It finds much more value in contemplation then in comprehension. Knowing about God is often more fueled with our Love for him then our knowledge. As Gregory the Great once said, “Every time we come closer to God, our desire for him is amplified; in the very fulfillment of the desire, there is planted a deeper yearning to experience more of the beloved.” An affective theologian can never separate their work from their relationship with God. The mantra of my mystical side can be summed up in the words of Evagrius of Pontus: “A theologian is one who prays, and one who prays is a theologian.” It seems that no matter how I approach God a part of me scoffs at the attempt.
One of the main reasons I chose to attend a seminary that is part of the Evangelical Covenant Church is because it is Evangelical in all the right ways. At North Park there is a focus on training people to know God not just know about Him. There is room for Intellectual Honesty without Spiritual Dishonesty and vice-versa.
The risk is always to put our life among God on hold while we learn about God. God is not an idea but an identity. A pursuit that is simply cerebral alienates us from the relationship that can advise us in overcoming the obstructions that follow pursuing a being that moves within our world but is beyond it. For as Ephesians chapter one tells us, it is God himself who reveals his mysteries. All the rest is a straining to cross the infinite.
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