A Sip of Milk When You Thought It Was Water

Have you ever taken a sip of milk when you thought you were reaching for a glass of water, that first wave of shocking disgust rising up your throat and the momentary thought of, "What the...!?" only to look down and notice that what you have in your hand is another liquid you had not (or could not remember having) poured?  And then, noticing that what you are indeed holding is a perfectly legitimate and equally tasty beverage, have that Calvin-and-Hobbes moment saying to yourself, "This second taste is much easier to get down, and, by golly, this third mouthful is downright scrumptious." 

I have had this moment several times in life, the threshold of which is made so exquisite by virtue of its utter and unrepeatable surprise.  The pleasure I gain from such moments of shock are heightened in that they are gained when I am completely alone, which invariably and exponentially increase the momentary allure of the event. 

I write this evening to tell you that I again have recently experienced this horrific pleasure, but rather than being a product of the gustatory senses, was one brought about through literature.  Allow me to explain.

I begin by stating I read the Bible on a regular basis.  I have read it from cover to cover (though not by starting at one cover and reading to the other, i.e. not in order- eventually I intend to accomplish this and within a short time window).  I have revisited various sections of it more times than I can count.  I'm quite sure I have read  through the New Testament upwards of a dozen times.  I sometimes have a plan as to which book in the Bible to begin reading as I finish whatever my latest selection happens to be.  Frequently however, I have no plan for which section to read next.  So I plop down my finger somewhere in the middle, or ask a friend what they are presently reading.  As it so happens, this month I was halfway through Jeremiah (on track with the former plan) when I began reading through Acts (as a friend suggested I follow along with him for the purposes of discussing it later with him). 

This dual reading necessitated having two bookmarks placed in one book.  (This is a problem I relish as I feel the burden of being a prodigy of the English language and possessing a prodigious quantity of bookmarks while at the same time realizing that I am reading far too few books concurrently for someone with so many bookmarks.  The problem of "far too many bookmarks" is accentuated by the fact that they are ever increasing in number as I frequently am given those supplemental advertisement cards that come in card games and unopened decks of cards and told by the previous owner, "Here, I bet this would make a great bookmark" sloughing it off on me, they being unwilling to put something "new" into the recycling.)  Needless to say, I jumped at the oportunity to employ my surplus of place-holding paraphernalia.

Let us codename bookmark one: milk and bookmark two: water corresponding to the books Jeremiah and Acts respectively.  You see the plot begin to thicken.  And as you may have guessed, one day while beginning my morning devotional at the breakfast table ("breakfast" indicative of consuming food relative to the hour of waking, but not to any particular hour of the day or night in of itself) I opened to what I thought was bookmark water, when in fact I had opened and instinctively begun reading at milk voicing with New Testament gusto the words from Jeremiah: "Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep in my pasture..."  'Bleeehhhyyyuuukkkkk... oh that's not right' went my brain.

As I flipped to Acts to restart my devotional, I was lolled into a dazed wonder that what I had experienced just then was none other than that long sought after but never-found-until-you're-not-looking-for-it-feeling of having surprised myself totally by accident.  I was bemused that such a gustatory sensation could be likened so closely to a series of thoughts.  But upon further recollection, I realized that the only reason the milk/water gustatory sensation causes such a sense of "taste surprise" is that it is not a product of taste so much as it is of brain activity- that of thinking one is going to get something which is different than what one gets.  "What one gets" is merely the external stimuli, a sensation for one of the five senses that the brain then does its best to rationalize, make sense of, process.  The world is not what I receive by way of my five senses; the world is what my brain deciphers based on the feedback from these senses.

Needless to say, I've been thinking a lot about the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament.  Both substantial; both have their own merits; both giving sustenance (from a spiritual perspective); and, as I believe, both true.  Yet I hear time and again people saying things like "I'm all down for this Jesus, who's in the New Testament, but I don't care for this God from the Old Testament.  He's pretty vindictive, gory, sadistic, etc."  I bet you've heard those 'etc.'s before or maybe you've got your own list. 

But what if that gut-twisting feeling we get when we read certain sections of the Old Testament doesn't rightly indicate that we are justified in filling in "God is etc." but rather that we have approached it from a mistaken context.  How often do we pick up the Old Testament thinking it's water when its really milk?  How much more do we approach the very world around us and mistake the stimuli received by our senses for stimulation in our brain?  Do we get stuck on the phenomenon and miss the phenomenal?

This arouses a memory.  I was listening to Richard Dawkins (a man I frequently find myself disagreeing with, and sharply at that) in an interview with Jon Stewart.  Dawkins said one thing in that interview however I assent to, even champion, without hesitation.  He said, "You should never believe anything without evidence."  This sentiment resonating so clearly in my soul, I sought to conclude how it was that a stanch atheist and I could so easily agree on this one thing, and yet part ways in all others.  While I'm sure I will spend the rest of my earthly life mulling this over, the answer is simple enough.  "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."  Heb 11:1  Faith is the evidence.

This tells me something extraordinary.  I, in comparison to the atheist, do not lack evidence.  I have a plethora of evidence.  The difference is that I have drawn different conclusions from the evidence.  This is something that did not happen on a sensory level but rather in my brain.  Does that mean it, faith, is all in my head?  If by all-in-my-head we mean I'm just wishful, making it up, or crazy- then no.  But if we mean that my faith came about through agented choices, not bound deterministically to stimuli, able to ask an open ended question within a universe not fully understood and listen for the logical reply- then yes, it is all in my head.  And I should add, so it is the same for Dawkins.

So the next time you're confronted with milk, don't try to cough it down as though thinking it were water.  Stop and reevaluate that perhaps you have an equally nourishing, but different beverage in your cup.  That is after all the paradox of faith.  You can't knock it till you've tried it, and you can't really have tried it till you've accepted it for what it is.