Mysticism and My Weakness

As Paul brings his “Fool’s Speech” to a crescendo in 2 Corinthians 12, he mentions visions and revelations of the Lord that he experienced at some point in his life. This high point of mystical experience for Paul serves as a counterpoint to the point that he wants to make to his readers according to the word that he received from the Lord: “Power is perfected in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). Applying this to the ideas of rest and redemption, rest is not a circumstantial state of physical and material tranquility, at least not in the “now,” but not because the Lord Jesus Christ is unable to do something about weakness in the form of insult, mistreatment, distress, persecution, and difficulty. Moreover, rest is neither “won” through worldly dominance nor grasped by world-flight, for the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ is sufficient to perfect us in our weakness when we take his easy yoke and light burden. Therefore, we are able to find Christ’s rest where we are.

And yet, there is a temptation for some to find rest in the kind of experience that Paul had of visions and revelations. That is to say, some might be tempted to find rest in a flight from the world to mysticism. With this reflection, I’d like to develop this temptation since it reflects currents in the spiritual but not religious category that is alive and well today. I will do this through J. H. Bavinck’s analysis of mysticism in one of his books.

First of all, and in a nod to my opening sermon illustration, Bavinck writes that “when someone thinks he can develop a conclusive and well-rounded image of mysticism, without taking a long list of nuances into account, he goes wrong.”[1] In the space of 700-800 words, all I can hope to do is introduce the idea and gesture towards some application. So, then, in a general sense, what is mysticism? As Bavinck summarizes it, mysticism

assumes that the human being possesses an organ with which it can mentally and physically experience and know God’s presence. Naturally, that organ is not the eye because the eye only brings us into contact with the sensible world. It is also no more the intellect or even reason, which certainly can think and give meaning about God but which is powerless in feeling his presence. There is, however, a different organ, the mind’s eye, the heart, which feels God (here in the sense of ‘is aware of’), that senses his nearness, that is able to provide contact with him.[2]

For mystical experiences, “this seeing of God cannot always take place without some preparation. … It often includes [the idea] that a person must withdraw from the busyness of life, from the maelstrom of daily events, and give himself over to solitude, to a great and deep silence.”[3] Mysticism, then, is a form a world-flight. It is an escape not to a tropical island for some rest but a different plane of existence.

As an approach to the world and life, mysticism has something to say about how to live in the world that stubbornly refuses to accept any attempt at flight from it. “As a rule, the morality of this mysticism is that one must seek a life that is free of the self…. You must free yourself of all love and hate, of all the heart’s passions and desires, of all honor and repute, and in the attentive silence of solitude, you must direct yourself wholly and only toward the only God. … Life’s only morality, then, is world flight, withdrawing yourself from every sphere of life.”[4] Mysticism stives for the greatest degree of not-being-in-the-world.

Though Bavinck charitably recognizes some grains of truth in mysticism, he points out its inadequacy. Concerning the god of mysticism, he writes, “Ultimately, you cannot pray to this God. There is no comfort in him, no help, no salvation. One can only worship him in deep devotion.” Regarding life, it “gives us no support in life, no guiding principle. It draws us out of life; it cuts us loose from love and from all seeking and striving. … In the struggle of life, it leaves us alone with our distress and temptation.”[5] To Paul’s thorn in the flesh, then, mysticism offers no answer and no opportunity to boast gladly in weakness (2 Cor 12:9).

The alternative is what Paul presents in 2 Cor 12:1-10, namely the sufficient grace of Christ to find rest where we are and in whatever weakness we experience, for because of who Christ is and what he has done for us, “when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor 12:10).

[1] J. H. Bavinck, Personality and Worldview, trans. James Eglinton (Wheaton: Crossway, 2023), 146–47.

[2] Bavinck, Personality and Worldview, 147–48.

[3] Bavinck, Personality and Worldview, 148.

[4] Bavinck, Personality and Worldview, 150.

[5] Bavinck, Personality and Worldview, 152.