Posted by Ravi Zacharias on February 16, 2016
Plato said that all philosophy begins with wonder. Wonder, to Plato, was that impulse that probed, investigated, and sought out explanations. Give a toy to a little boy and in moments it is broken because he has opened it up to see what makes it whir or tick or chime or speak. It is our hidden Narnia, into which we long to step and explore. It is the rotating musical merry-go-round that entrances the child. It is the sight of a jet plane or a rocket surging into the skies and the marvel, if only for a moment, at such design and power and beauty. It is also the touch of a hand that makes you wish that time would stand still, the musical score that grips the soul.
Yet it was Francis Bacon who ruefully observed that though it may be true that all philosophy begins with wonder, it is also true that wonder dies with knowledge. Explanation is the termination point of mystery, analysis the death-knell of curiosity. The parts are greater than the whole when you are in pursuit, but they become lesser than the whole when it is no longer a mystery and the toy no longer enchants.
Indeed, most of us can go back to a time in our lives when dreams of a life filled with wonder throbbed within our souls. In fact, that very stage of dreaming finds its own fulfillment in a marvelous disposition we call hope. But time has led us also to believe that Bacon does have a point. Is it not because of the delight of anticipation that all children love Christmas Eve even more than they love Christmas Day? Is it not because the fulfillment of his longings is just moments away that a youngster, though thoroughly fatigued, will deny sleep and fight to keep his eyes open? But then comes the day after Christmas and reality strikes. The longing is now gone and everything that spelled wonder is being packed up in a box. Does unwrapping the gift take away from the gift? Why is the exhausting pursuit of the human heart for contentment so convoluted? Why does the enchantment that we long for seem so elusive and almost scandalously complex?
I believe G.K Chesterton was absolutely right when he astutely observed that the older one gets, the more it takes to fill the heart with wonder—and only God is big enough for that.
Perhaps President Theodore Roosevelt understood this, for he had an interesting routine habit, almost a ritual. Every now and then, along with the naturalist William Beebe, he would step outside at dark, look into the night sky, find the faint spot of light at the lower left-hand corner of Pegasus, and one of them would recite: “That is the Spiral Galaxy of Andromeda. It is as large as our Milky Way. It is one of a hundred million galaxies. It is seven hundred and fifty thousand light years away. It consists of one hundred billion suns, each larger than our own sun.” There would be a pause and then Roosevelt would grin and say, “Now I think we feel small enough! Let’s go to bed.”
Is this not the point of Psalm 8, when the psalmist utters: “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens…. When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers … what is man that you are mindful of him? …You made him ruler over the works of your hands.”
When I ponder the wonder that is around us and see the vastness of its splendor, I also remember what the poet John Donne said: “There is nothing that God hath established in the constant course of nature, and which therefore is done every day, but would seem a Miracle, and exercise our admiration, if it were done but once.” Donne is making the same point that God made in the Book of Job, when He asks Job if he knows the mystery of how a bird homes in on its flight. It is what Jesus was saying in Matthew 6:26–30: “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? See how the lilies of the field grow…. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field … will he not much more clothe you?” Will not this God of wonder, who has arrayed the creatures of this world with such inspiring traits, fill us with his own sustenance and inspiration?
What is wonder? Wonder is that possession of the mind that enchants the emotions while never surrendering reason. It is a grasp on reality that does not need constant high points in order to be maintained, nor is it made vulnerable by the low points of life’s struggle. It sees in the ordinary the extraordinary, and it finds in the extraordinary the reaffirmations for what it already knows. Wonder interprets life through the eyes of eternity while enjoying the moment, but never lets the momentary vision exhaust the eternal. Wonder knows how to read the shadows because it knows the nature of light. Wonder knows that while you cannot look at the light you cannot look at anything else without it. It is a journey like a walk through the woods, over the usual obstacles and around the common distractions while the voice of direction leads, saying, “This is the way, walk ye in it” (Isaiah 30:21). It is not at all surprising that of the seventy usages of the word “wonder” in the Old Testament nearly half of them are by David, the sweet singer of Israel. Wonder and music go hand in hand. Wonder cannot help but sing. Even nature recognizes that.
There is wonder all around us, and it is God’s desire to fill us with that wonder that makes life enchanting and sacred. We cannot help but sing when that happens. Maybe that is why of all the religions in the world, there is none with the wealth of music that the Christian faith offers. We sing because His name is “Wonderful.”
God is like the light. Wonder is like the shadow. If you chase the shadow you will never catch up to it. It might even disappear. If you walk toward the light, the shadow will always pursue you. That is when the heart sings with gladness, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever” (Psalm 23:6).
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