At the end of this year, I went to a conference about mission. One of the things we learned about was Ephesians. In fact we studied the whole Bible book. One of the emphases of Ephesians is mystery: the glorious, revealed mystery of the gospel, the mystery that God can unite all people and all things through Christ (if of course we let Him).

Interestingly, recently I stumbled upon the following quote:

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom the emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand wrapped in awe, is as good as dead —his eyes are closed. The insight into the mystery of life, coupled though it be with fear, has also given rise to religion. To know what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms—this knowledge, this feeling is at the center of true religiousness.

–Albert Einstein, Living Philosophies

I found this really interesting in the light of the emphasis on “mystery” in Ephesians. (If you haven’t read it yet, read the Bible book). The mystery of the gospel is something that should leave us in wonder and in awe. We should be thrilled by the amazing things God is doing, the amazing position He gives us as His children, the amazing riches and “glorious inheritance of the saints”… And be in awe of Him Himself.

And I do not say this to be legalistic, but because if we are truly to enjoy the beauty of the gospel, “to have the eyes of our heart enlightened”, which can only happen to us through the Holy Spirit, only then will we truly enjoy it, and have the correct view of it. For us, the mystery need not be “impenetrable”: the Lord has chosen to reveal it to us. And yet, at the same time, it so beautiful and so high, and the love of the Lord so deep that it is beyond our human understanding. Let us not lose our awe and wonder at it.

The gospel is not mundane, the gospel is not normal, the gospel, and the Lord who gives us the gospel, should thrill us to the core. It should reverberate the strings of our heart and spill out of us in all its glory as we sing a song to the world of God’s beauty.

Let us be in awe, in awe of the mystery of the Lord.