Deuteronomy 29:29 The secret things belong to the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children for ever… We are all conscious of the immense inquisitiveness of the human mind and the limitations of human knowledge. The desires to be, to know and to become are the strongest desires of human nature. In the first ardour of life we are sensible of no law of limitation in our powers. Life is boundless, and our power of knowing seems boundless too. But sooner or later we are all apt to be overcome by the humiliating sense of the limitation of our faculties. We ask questions for which there are no replies. In the true sense of the word, we are all agnostics, and the term really expresses humility of mind rather than stubborn pride of reason. We have all of us to say upon a thousand matters: "I do not know; I have no means of knowing!" Agnosticism is merely another term for the limitations of human knowledge. But because we are ignorant of many things it does not follow that we are absolutely sure of none. We may be ignorant of the laws of light, but we know there is light; we cannot explain the origin of life, but we know there is such a thing as birth. Thus we may have a sufficient working knowledge of a subject without knowing much about it, just as a man may avail himself of the railway or the electric light without being in the least able to explain the mechanics of the one or the chemistry of the other. The fact is, that for the working business of life, if one may use the term, very little knowledge is needed. And it is so in religion. We may be bad theologians, and yet good Christians; agnostics in intellect, yet believers in spirit. Granting the fact of judgment, we are troubled by our incompetence to understand its method, and we say with the Israelite, "Wherefore hath the Lord done this unto this land? What meaneth the heat of this great anger?" And as we ponder the problem we can start a hundred questions for which we have no reply. Why, if this were a judgment, did it not come before? Why has it never been repeated? The one thing for us to learn is the thing that is revealed, and that is that sin is punished, and terribly punished. Learn that, and for you the judgment is justified. So again, with the secret of character and destiny. When we begin to examine character in the light of destiny, how perplexed are we! Who has not met a type of church-going goodness which has repelled and disgusted him, and a type of natural piety which has allured and satisfied him? And then we ask, "Which are the sheep and which the goats?" And here, throughout the world, are thousands of men and women whom you cannot classify on any rigid method. They pass out of the world with what seem to us indeterminate characters; they have never refused the truth, but rather have simply stood outside the sphere of the spiritual; and as our thoughts pierce into the dim profound of that unseen world, out of the darkness the words ring back upon us: "And what of these?" Every step deepens the mystery, increases the bewilderment. Why try to reduce to definiteness that which the Bible has left mercifully indefinite? Is not this part of God's secret, and is there nothing revealed to us clearly that we cannot fail to understand it? Yes, this much at least is clear: Whether there be probation or not hereafter, there is probation now. Passing on to the Discipline of Sorrow in Life, the same truth applied. God did not ask us to say that "All was for the best." For the best that little children shall be left motherless! All God asks that we shall say, "Thy will be done," leaving the secret with Him, and taking to ourselves the lesson of obedience and trust. But still more forcibly does the lesson apply to the great mysteries of Christian truth. For whosoever approaches Jesus Christ is met by four great secrets of Christianity, four great mysteries of the faith: the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the Atonement, and the promise of Immortality and Redemption through the death of Christ. We are unable to grasp these mysteries. Is there any theologian who has actually explained either, or made them possible to the human intellect? The keener the intellect which applies itself to the task, the more certain is it of failure, because the more numerous will be the difficulties which it will discern. And that is precisely where men make so fatal a mistake; they try to force themselves into faith by a process of reason, to apprehend intellectually that which can only be spiritually discerned. I may be alive without knowing anything of physiology; my heart may beat though I cannot tell bow it beats, and have never heard of the circulation of the blood. I may be conscious without understanding the philosophy of consciousness; I may think without knowing how thought is generated; I may be a good citizen with but small knowledge of my country's law; and a good soldier with small understanding of imperial politics. And so I may be a good Christian though I can prove neither to my own nor any other person's satisfaction the credibility of the Incarnation, the Resurrection, or the Atonement. It is not, stubbornness of intellect, but humility, that says in such a case, "I do not know." The working knowledge that we need for the Christian life is relatively small. Christianity is not a thing of high philosophies and subtle inferences; it moves along the plane of common life; it proves itself by the silent revelation of its power to save within the heart. It asks of us nothing more than to do our duty in the sight of God. (W. J. Dawson.) Parallel Verses KJV: The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law. |
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