You had to be there
Year C
John 14:8127
"You
had to be there!"
It’s
what people say to you who believe that the personal experience of something is
everything and they aren't really able to describe it adequately. Such statements sometimes make me doubt
whether the fact being related is really true.
If you can't explain it to me, maybe it was a figment of your
imagination or of your emotions or those of a group gone wild. On such a subjective basis hangs every
adolescent ghost story which has ever been told.
Should not
men and women, rather, be presented with a narrative which is
comprehensible and objective enough to
be believed even if they weren't there themselves? Should our statements not be equally
convincing to a believer or a doubter?
What do
we make, then, of Jesus' words: "This
is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees
him nor knows him."
Jesus
would seem to suggest that there is such a thing as truth which must be
experienced and not merely talked about, dissected and laid out in
propositions.
We are
not without some experience of that. The
love we have for the humans who are closest to us – fierce, protective and
forgiving – does not require a case to be made.
The dreams which motivate us are not always explicable - we find ourselves moved by deep things
which defy clear explanation.
A case
can always be made. The Christian faith
needs to be presented comprehensibly to the world. But when you are explaining it you are
talking about something you tasted for yourself first and experienced as
mystery and paradox. You felt it before
you could talk about it – because you were, in fact, there yourself.
