As you do not know the way of the wind or how the bones form in the womb of her who is with child, so you do not know the works of God.
Ecclesiastes 11:5
One of my favorite movies is the silly 1985 comedy Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. Directed by Tim Burton, the film tells the story of Pee-wee, a man-child who delights in goofy toys, Rube Goldberg contraptions, and his precious bicycle. When his bicycle is stolen, he begins the hilarious search to recover it. Just before the theft, we see Pee-wee visit the local bicycle shop to pick up his handlebar horn which he had left for repair. It’s returned to him by Dottie, a worker at the store who has a none-too-subtle crush on Pee-wee. The crush is not reciprocal. So when she begins to ask Pee-wee for a date, he cuts her off with mock seriousness: “There’s a lotta things about me you don’t know anything about, Dottie. Things you wouldn’t understand. Things you couldn’t understand. Things you shouldn’t understand.” Pee-wee snatches his horn from her hand and quickly exits the store, hiding a self-satisfied smile and leaving a confused Dottie staring blankly after him.
In 2002, United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was asked about the lack of evidence linking the government of Iraq with weapons of mass destruction. His answer would have been at home in the pages of George Orwell’s Animal Farm:
“As we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”
Although easy to lampoon, Rumsfeld’s answer is, in fact, concisely meaningful and echoes a well-known proverb:
He who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool. Shun him.
He who knows not, and knows that he knows not, is simple. Teach him.
He who knows, and knows not that he knows, is asleep. Wake him.
He who knows, and knows that he knows, is wise. Follow him.
For the Christian, there is much certainty. The scriptures lay out for us a number of sure things: that God exists and that he loves us, that he has made himself known in his son, that the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ save all who believe, that God dwells within all believers through his Spirit, and that Jesus will return to punish the wicked and reward those who trust and await him. There are many other biblical certainties as well, but they subsist within the grand arc of God’s work in Christ. As Paul reminds the Corinthians, No matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. This covers a lot of ground.
On the other hand, Christians know far less than we think we do—infinitely less. (Unbelievers, of course, know nothing at all, but I’ve discussed this elsewhere.) As Hamlet says, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” He might have included theology too. It’s not simply a matter of seek and ye shall find; some things are forever beyond our reach.
There are two kinds of inaccessible knowledge. The first is forbidden knowledge, that which we humans can know but should not. The great example is the knowledge of good and evil embodied as a tree in the garden of Eden. The Lord God commands Adam, “You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” The prohibition is for the man’s own good, for if he eats from it, God tells him, “you will certainly die.” Not all forbidden knowledge is ominous. Just before his ascension, Jesus tells his disciples, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority.” This is a nice way of saying that how God runs his business is none of our business. But even at the most basic level there are things we are forbidden to know. James warns us against ignorant boasting: You do not even know what will happen tomorrow. God could tell us, but he’s not going to. The only reliable compass we have to negotiate such pervasive ignorance is faith.
The other kind of inaccessible knowledge is that which by its very nature transcends comprehension. God is forthright about it: “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Recognizing this, King David exclaims, Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain! Even faith cannot grasp such things. God informs the prophet Habakkuk: “I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told.” Moreover, although Paul insists that we now have the mind of Christ, he too exclaims: Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! So high are God’s ways, says Paul, that we don’t even know what we’re supposed to pray for. If not for the Holy Spirit’s intercession, our prayers would be Jabberwocky. When it comes to God, the unknowns are definitely the biggest slice of the pie chart.
Of the things that we are not permitted and will never be permitted to know, the one shown to John about the triumphant Christ may be the most intriguing:
I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and wages war. His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself.
No one in all creation will learn this mysterious name. Perhaps it is an eternal secret held between the Father and the Son. “No one knows the Son except the Father,” says Jesus, “and no one knows the Father except the Son.” Perhaps we could not grasp it if it were revealed to us. No matter. What we do know of Jesus defies understanding. For example, Paul tells us that Jesus is the image of the invisible God. What are we to make of that? If a blunt known known such as this confounds us . . . well, just seat me next to poor old Job and we’ll call it good.
And so we have it: the fundamental inscrutability of God and the unsurmountable ignorance of humankind. Thankfully, figuring out God has never been the program. Besides, even if we could fathom all mysteries and all knowledge and had faith that could move mountains, without love we would have nothing. God’s love is all of God, and those who receive his love know all that need be known. This known known makes the unknown known. And so Paul prays that we may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. As John declares: God is love. And that, my friends, is the greatest known known of all.
