The Mystery of an Outlandishly Queer Creation

Queer:  1 strange; odd: she had a queer feeling that they were being watched.

Creation:  1 the action or process of bringing something into existence: the creation of a coalition government | job creation.

This planet has some crazy schtuff in it. The Sunda Colugo.

Yeah, I never heard of it either, but here it is in a picture! The giraffe. The whale. The duck-billed platypus. Countless varieties of flowers, birds, and some 9 million species of bugs. 9 million varieties of bugs!

And let’s not even get started on the universe beyond our little planet.

It’s a queer creation indeed. The world is full of such strangeness—things none of us would’ve begun to imagine.

Queer:  2 informal, chiefly derogatory (esp. of a man) homosexual.

Creation:  2 (the Creation) the bringing into existence of the universe, esp. when regarded as an act of God. • everything so created; the universe: our alienation from the rest of Creation.

Then we come to people—just look at the variety. Height, weight, shape, color, hair, abilities, preferences. The combination of variables is truly endless.

I learned the words “boy” and “girl” when I was tiny. I could easily tell one from the other. But the older I grew, the more variation I saw even in that; it’s not the simple “boy” “girl” I always thought it was. Some boys are quite masculine, some are quite feminine. Same with girls. On a sliding scale of masculine to feminine, you can find any gender anywhere along the way. Not only that, but some people have both or neither genders. As a young adult, I saw a guest on Oprah who had neither gender. Neither “boy” nor “girl” body parts. What? How could that even be?? Truly, it boggles the mind.

I realize that this can be disconcerting for many. Okay, for most. Because we like to fit things neatly in a box. Too many variables can be unnerving, even downright frightening. But to artificially limit variety to make us feel comfortable and safe does a grave injustice to the infinite variety God created for us—and for Him—to enjoy!

I’d been having a discussion with a commenter on my blog about gender, and she actually wrote this: “The Bible is not a mystery.” The Bible is not a mystery? Seriously? We’re talking about what many of us believe to be a long-preserved book inspired by God, written by a variety of men (presumably men, not women), over some thousand-plus years, to be read over the millennia. And a commenter says, “The Bible is not a mystery.” I wonder if she might say God is not a mystery?

The Bible is a mystery. God is a mystery. The universe is a mystery. Human beings are a mystery. Gender is a mystery. As much as we might want to put fold it up and fit it neatly into a box, none of this will go in a box. To try to force it in a box is to minimize and distort it. It may feel more comfortable but it is inauthentic.

How about this instead?

Let us revel in the mystery! Let us enjoy the unfolding wonder of something so far beyond our comprehension that any attempt to confine it simply strains our brain. Let us set our fears aside and see what the wild variety of the universe, and of God, has to teach us. If we trust, if we have faith, we will find something much more beautiful than a misshapen and squished reality. We will find wonder beyond our wildest imagination. That is how queerly God created it!