Lessons From the Clouds

The Stecoah Valley is nestled just three miles from Fontana Dam and in the extreme western tip of North Carolina that forms the “Tale of the Dragon” and the start of the backbone of the Smoky Mountains.  It is considered a rain forest and like this morning, unusual for me to awaken mornings without the full or patial view of the mountains and valleys blanketed with voluminous, imagery forming, pure white, clouds; spring, summer and fall.  Sometimes I just stand for minutes, and watch as the rising sun plays its music of color off the movement and shapes of the clouds.  It is an awesome spiritual delight to behold. Living at the level of an overlook that affords a panoramic view of these majestic views often sounds a siren call beckoning me to just gaze at their beauty. I am not the only one who hears this call. On sunny days, the thousands of overlooks are filled with individuals coming to gaze at these mountains as the sun cascades down their voluptuously foliaged backs, giving off a "smoky effect".

There are other times, however, when Quiet Rest, itself, is enveloped or shrouded in a thick blanket of cloud. Grey and foreboding, this blanketing cloud-blockade obscures any hope of viewing the grandeur and beauty that I know is there. Hidden from view, all that is left to gaze on is an impenetrable wall of cloud.

My human experience of God appears very much like that, at times.  There are many days when God's grandeur and glory are on full display. And I am assured, like the ancient Hebrew poet that as I "lift up our eyes to the mountains" my "help comes from the Lord" (Psalm 131:1-2). At other times, God seems obscured by clouds—clouds of doubt, suffering, disappointment, or pervasive evil. Sometimes it seems that there are far more cloudy days, than clear ones. My experience of God is like that of the biblical Job going "forward but he is not there, and backward, but I cannot perceive him" (Job 23:8-9).

Deus absconditus is the Latin phrase that describes this phenomenon—the hidden God. The hiddenness of God is a particularly painful reality for those of us who affirm faith in God. From my experience as a chaplain, it is my belief that it may be equally as equally difficult for people who do not affirm any faith: Where is this hidden God believers want me to follow, they will ask? It is an apologetic conundrum experienced by many throughout history. Blaise Pascal, one of the greatest Christian apologists, described his own experience with deus absconditus as a pitiable mystery:  He says at one point:  "This is what I see and what troubles me. I look on all sides, and I see only darkness everywhere. Nature presents to me nothing which is not a matter of doubt and concern. If I saw nothing there which revealed Divinity, I would come to a negative conclusion, if I saw everywhere the signs of a Creator, I would remain peacefully in faith. But, seeing too much to deny and too little to be sure, I am in a state to be pitied." Pascal speaks poignantly of the pitiable state when the clouds of our human experience abscond God away. Hidden behind the wall of doubt, we are left with an utterly obstructed view.

I’m thinking, this may have been the same experience of Jesus as he wept in the Garden of Gethsemane. Under so much duress, his sweat mingled with drops of blood, the likely result of broken capillaries under his skin. And from the cross, his recitation of Psalm 22 became his cry of abandonment: "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34). Here, the cry of deus absconditus from his only, beloved son. These are the last words uttered by Jesus in Matthew and Mark's gospels. John doesn't include them at all. Of the three synoptic gospels, only Luke ends his crucifixion narrative with Jesus quoting from another of Israel's songs: "Into Thy hands, I commit my spirit" (Luke 23:46; Psalm 31:5). Jesus utters a whisper of trust in response to his feelings of forsakenness.

Perhaps, like Jesus, there are times when the best I can do is to yield myself to the God who seems hidden behind the clouds—and perhaps to acknowledge that my faith is not always the warm assurance of perpetually clear skies that I have thought am entitled too or thought I might have. Even for those outside of faith, such admissions may well be a needed authenticity. I have concluded that despite persistent faith, God is not always present, available, or ever-ready in times of need.

In this sense, Flannery O'Connor, one of my favorite Catholic authors wrote, faith is not the guarantee for security or comfort. In The Habit of Being she writes: "I think there is no suffering greater than what is caused by the doubts of those who want to believe. I know what torment this is, but I can only see it, in myself anyway, as the process by which faith is deepened... What people don't realize is how much religion costs. They think faith is a big electric blanket, when of course it is a cross... You arrive at enough certainty to be able to make your way, but it is making it in darkness. Don't expect faith to clear things up for you. It is trust, not certainty."

In the experience of deus absconditus, God seems hidden from view just like my majestic Smokey Mountains. Yet even here, faith, not securing or comforting, still seeks, still searches, still points me towards the God who is there behind the clouds.