Kevin uses two metaphors to describe ways of understanding God. The box is about comprehension, while the carrot on the stick is about an unattainable pursuit. Is this differentiation helpful for you? If so, is your understanding of God more like the box metaphor or the carrot on the stick?
If understanding God is like following a carrot on a stick that we’ll never catch, why should we even try?
ABOUT THE INTERVIEWEE: Kevin Potter works with Oasis USA in Pasadena, CA.
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“It is easy to understand God, as long as you don’t try to explain him.”. I love this quote, but to Ben’s point on the last video, the quote already try’s a tiny bit to explain “HIM” through the use of the masculine pronoun. Either way, I still love this quote…..
Jason
PS-Craig, you do such a great job on these videos!!!!!!
Interesting…I’ve often been frustrated with the idea that “you can’t put God in a box” that is followed by a list of rules and regulations that attempt to do that exactly. I think that the idea with the carrot is that we DO eventually get it. I think that when we are “perfected” like Paul talks about, that we’re munching on that carrot.
Once again great questions! For me the “box” has always been non-existent. Last week’s question “God is_____” was a fun one for me to think about. I ended up with God is ever-changing, and you just can’t contain something that’s constantly changing like that in a box. As for the carrot, I remember being 16 and reading St. Augustine’s quote “There is another form of temptation, even more fraught with danger. This is the disease of curiosity. It is this which drives us to try and discover the secrets of nature, those secrets which are beyond our understanding, which can avail us nothing and which man should not wish to learn.” I also remember thinking that was the biggest load of crap I’d ever read and it became one of the catalyst for my never ending quest for answers. I thoroughly enjoy the chase, no matter how frustrating it can be, and I’m not sure if I ever want to catch the elusive carrot. It is my fear that once I’ve decided that “I’ve got it” I’ll become stagnant, I’ll stop looking, searching, seeking, and growing. I can read the same scripture several times and see something I missed, or walk away with a different understanding each time. If I ever catch the carrot, I’ll probably stop reading the bible, stop attending church, and stop visiting sites like this. I like to thing that God designed it for us to never fully understand him. After all, what’s the point of continuing the chase once you’ve caught the prize?
I think we always subconsciously do the box thing in understanding all kinds of things, God included. We think we have the concept figured out, and in defining it we create a box.
Then we smell the carrot outside the box, search a little more, and now have a bigger box.
Then we smell the carrot again, and have to build bigger and bigger boxes.
Even if we don’t ever fully eat the carrot, at least our boxes get torn apart and rebuilt larger than they were before–and we usually at least get a bite of the carrot.