He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
Colossians 1:17 (NIV)

Wendy and I have been watching an entertaining British mystery series on PBS of late entitled Professor T. The show revolves around a quirky character with an out-of-control case of OCD who happens to be a professor of Criminology at Cambridge. The good professor has every one figured out but himself, and as the series progresses, we begin to learn the childhood events that helped to produce his quirks. We’re really enjoying it.

As I’ve progressed in my life journey, I’ve come to appreciate the powerful fragility of childhood memories. On one hand they are incredibly powerful because they are what I remember. On the other hand they are incredibly fragile because what I remember is through the narrow, largely uninformed lens of a child. As I wrote in the chapter-a-day trek through Job, “I don’t know what I don’t know.”

In the same way, I find that my understanding of Jesus has changed over the years, and continues to paradoxically move towards the infinite unknowable. When I was a child, my perceptions of Jesus were simple and child-like. After 40 years of relationship as a disciple, I find my knowledge and perceptions have expanded greatly. I find it fascinating that Jesus told us that salvation requires the simple faith of a child, and that Paul said that spiritual maturity requires us to put away childish things.

In Paul’s opening chapter to the followers of Jesus’ in the town of Colossae, he addresses the believers with the cosmic Christ that he met on the road to Damascus and has continued to know as he paradoxically moved towards the infinite unknowable. Christ is, he explains, before anything ever was, and in Him all things “hold together.”

I love that physics had taught me about Dark Matter and Dark Energy, which theoretically constitutes 95% of the universe but we really don’t know how to detect it or observe it. We all learn in school that atoms are made up of these protons and neutrons spinning, but to spin you have have space, so there is space in matter and a force that keeps the protons and neutrons in their orbit within the space that’s within matter. We’re in the dark.

I personally think Paul was on to something. He had progressed to a point of knowing in the infinite unknowable.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself enjoying a bit of awe and wonder. I find that I do that more and more the further I get in my spiritual journey. The more I know Christ, the more I know that I don’t know. This leads to the awe and wonder, which leads me to His holiness.

After the second season of Professor T., the good professor has learned that his snatches of childhood memories are small pieces of a larger puzzle. Wendy and I are looking forward to the next season to find out, along with him, what the larger puzzle looks like.

Today, I head out to spend the day, and then the evening, with my client. It’s day 20,983 of my earthly journey. As I walk to the conference center this morning, I’ll ponder these things in awe of Jesus, who is so much more than I knew when I began to follow Him as a child, and yet there is far more about Him that I don’t know than I can possibly know.

But, I know that He is holding everything together.

I still have that child-like faith.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.