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| Photo Credit: Ganapathy Kumar - Unsplash |
There's a time of year early in the winter when a moon-walk with a preschooler can happen before bedtime. If the night is still, and the moon is full, and the Christmas lights are all on in the neighbourhood it can be downright magical.
They are out on a night like this, four year old Jayden and his Mom, walking to see if the baby will fall asleep in the stroller. But also just because the air is cold and fresh on their faces, and it's been the kind of day where a magical moon-walk helps to set things straight.
Then Jayden notices that the moon is following them.
Astonishing news! He informs his mother. "Mommy, look! The moon follows us! It only goes as fast as us and stops whenever we stop!" He demonstrates, running ahead a bit, face turned up to the moon with the wide-eyed expression of someone making the kind of discovery that just might change life on the planet as we know it. Mind blown!
Mom explains, even as Jayden continues his demonstration. "Actually, it only looks that way. The moon is so far away, but when we walk by the trees and houses we pass them by because they are so much closer. The moon only looks like it's following us behind them."
But Jayden is not convinced. Clearly the moon is moving. He can see it for himself. He feels compelled to correct his Mom's obviously inaccurate information. "No. Mommy. Look! It's moving with us." He runs a little way ahead again, then stops. "See?"
A short episode of 'ridiculous conversations with a preschooler' ensues, but Jayden won't budge. His perception is his truth. Mommy, despite being all grown up and having completed a fair bit of schooling and life that has included at least some basic science, is wrong. He's not rude about it. Not annoyed or condescending. Just very patient as he explains it again and again, offering proof in his repeated demonstrations.
Not wanting to lose the serenity of the walk, Mom acquiesces enough to say, "Well, Jayden, yes, it sure does look like the moon follows us." And lets it drop. One day more abstract thinking will develop and he'll figure that out. Not tonight. Tonight he is a confident boy being followed by the moon, and it's magical.
He's only four. No one wants to steal his wonder.
But then we grow up. And we eventually come to different understandings. And we are faced with the reality that sometimes what seems irrefutable is not. We can be so sure...until we're not.
And I wonder sometimes, if God is not like a Mom out on a walk with her boy under a full moon. And I wonder if we are not that child, engaging in ridiculous conversations, trying to explain things, or beg for things, or rage about things, with the One who created whatever it is we are so sure of.
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways." declares the LORD. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." Isaiah 55:8-9
Our perception becomes our truth.
But.
Maybe the moon is just too far away for us to see things clearly, even on what seems a clear night.
I am necessarily humbled by this. Especially as one who studies theology, a space where too often we end up explaining things as if we know. As if.
I am also needfully comforted by this. I anticipate that one day my winter night's walk with my Divine Parent will come to an end.
And I will be taken safely home where all the thinking can be put to bed.
"My heart is not proud, O LORD, my eyes are not haughty; I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me. But I have stilled and quieted my soul, like a weaned (satisfied) child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me. Psalm 131:1
