"A pair of what? Pair of ducks?"

So I was thinking today. Well, I've been thinking a lot lately, mostly about guidelines and schedules, but this evening I was thinking some deep, non-work-related thoughts, trying to wrap my brain around some stuff that I've known for awhile but just today struck me in a new way.

Spiritual truths are often paradoxical, full of apparent contradictions. Not that spiritual truth is inherently non-understandable, standing contrary to reason or logic--I don't believe this at all--but rather, that it can often make us pause and scratch our heads. Quote I read today: "Paradoxical statements arrest our attention because of their apparent contradiction, and motivate us to resolve the contradiction by learning and reflection (i.e....questioning our own presuppositions)." This is the difference between a biblical paradox and a Buddhist "what's the sound of one hand clapping" kind of paradox. One is a means to freeing yourself from rational thought, the other presupposes rationality and an absolute truth at the end of the head-scratching road.

But anyway. That was not my deep thought. (If you follow the link, you'll see that I stole that one from Gary DeLashmutt) That was the disclaimer to my deep thought. For those of you still reading, that is.

My deep thought was about one spiritual paradox in particular. The Bible describes God as being both transcendent and immanent. In other words, God is described as being objectively holy, separate, surpassing knowledge, "above and independent of the material universe" (thank you, dictionary.com)...while, at the same time, being subjectively near, within, and personally involved with people. It says that both things are true of God, and have always been true of him. That's hard for me to wrap my mind around. It seems that most of us tend to lean toward one of these attributes or the other (and probably flip-flop back and forth between them). I can relate.

Sometimes, God seems transcendent, but not immanent. This makes him seem cold, distant, indifferent, and disinterested. Sure, maybe he's big and powerful, but he's probably not very nice. Any interaction I might have with this kind of God would be mainly to appease, but ultimately I'd probably want to avoid him. Like the scowling, impossible-to-please father of the rich kid in [insert movie title here]. Stay out of his way.

But then, at other times, God seems immanent but not transcendent. This makes him seem warm, friendly, and casual. This image is more like the cool older brother who you love to hang out with because he's so fun and laid-back and lets you get away with stuff that your mom would never approve of. He's personable and fun to be with, but he's not really very god-like. My interactions with him would probably be like most of my interactions with friends--genuinely enjoyable, but also limited. I don't hestitate to share personal things or needs with those I'm close to, but I'm also not surprised if they don't have the ability to fix my problem. I don't expect my friends to be all-powerful, I just want them to listen and care. Sometimes I have the same expectations of God.

But the thing that totally blows my mind is that the Bible describes God as both. Both. Seriously, think about that for a minute. What would that kind of God be like? What would my interactions with that kind of God look like? What would that kind of God ultimately want from me?

Big questions. I certainly don't have the answers all figured out, but I've seen this paradox fleshed out in one place--the life of Jesus. He was unarguably immanent--he hung out with all kinds of people and got down into the commonplace, dirty-knees reality of human existence. He touched people, welcomed them, and they were irresistibly drawn to him. The majority of people think of Jesus this way and wouldn't deny that he was good and lived a life that demonstrated that he cared about people and about their needs.

But if your view of Jesus stops there, it stops short of the biblical account of who he was and what his purpose was. Jesus attracted a lot of people, but he also royally pissed a lot of people off. Why? Partly because of his claim to be God. He also challenged the bad theology of the current religious people who had rewritten the Old Testament laws to justify their oppression of people and their own self-indulgence. But anyway, the point is that Jesus polarized people's thinking and made outrageous claims that ultimately caused them accuse him of blasphemy and kill him. Seriously, read the book of John--what you'll find is not exactly the sheep-petting, doe-eyed Jesus that most of us remember from Sunday school. Jesus didn't claim that his purpose was to come and teach people how to live good lives and be nice to each other--he claimed that his purpose was to die to pay the penalty for human sin and rebellion against God, to stand in our place and take the punishment we deserved but could never pay ourselves. This is a glimpse of God's transcendence--he unapologetically recognized our sin, the broken, helpless state we were in, and he boldly stepped in as the only one perfect enough to solve the problem.

Anyway, enough rambling. In the process of thinking about this paradox of love and justice, humanity and deity, nearness and separateness, I ended up with a question. Who in the world would imagine a God like this? If God is (as many people say) a fabrication, an imaginary deity who exists only in the minds of people who created him out of their desire to feel important and create a sense of purpose for their lives...if this is true, who would have come up with a God like this? A God whose ways run so contradictory to our own "default" way of operating? A God who is perfectly transcendent, self-existent and perfect, and yet chooses to come down to my level...meet me where I am, speak to the need inside that hurts the most? A God whose standard is perfection (transcendence), and yet let his heart break for us in our inability to meet it and chose instead to come down from heaven, become a man, ultimately to suffer and die just so that we could have a way to come back into a relationship with him (immanence)?

If I were to fabricate a god for myself, I don't think he would look like this. This is way too outside of my frame of reference. My hand-crafted god would probably end up looking a lot more like me.