Tuesday, August 9, 2011

String Theory

Dad took the three of us kids into the kitchen with a pseudo-serious demeanor that made us wonder what he was up to.  He was playful like that, and by his gestures and body movements it was easy for us to tell that this was some kind of game.  Leaning down as if to communicate some deep and wonderful secret he told us, “Did you know that there are invisible strings that hang from the sky all around the world?”  Our immediate response was something like, “Pffffffff…… Sure Dad, Whatever.”  His eyes then widened with his best look of feigned shock and said, “Oh no, no, it’s true.  In fact, there are strings hanging from the ceiling in this very room.”  The three of us were not going to be gullible over this, and so we defiantly (yet playfully) said, “OK – Prove it then!!”

Picking up a standard number 2 pencil and rubbing it up and down with his thumb and pointer finger my Dad responded, “I will… watch me drag this pencil across the floor with one of the strings.”  He then looked up towards the light in the room, and with great focused concentration moved his head until suddenly ‘spotting’ something.  Reaching out into space he ‘plucked’ what was presumably one of the strings and began to ‘wrap’ it around the pencil, tying it into a knot.  At this point the three of us were thoroughly heckling my Dad and laughing at the whole ridiculous routine.  For a 7, 9 and 11 year old – we were a pretty tough audience.  Dad interrupted our hilarity with “Wait! Watch this…”  Carefully placing the pencil on the floor with the ‘string’ in his right hand, he slowly moved his hand across the floor…. And the pencil followed!!

“What?!! Gimme that pencil!” The three of us instantly began analyzing the pencil for any suspicious additions.  There was nothing…. Just a regular pencil.  “Wait a minute… what’d you do to it!!” we demanded.  Of course we weren’t about to fall for that stupid ‘string’ thing, but Dad had definitely done something to cause the pencil to move across the floor.  Searching for an explanation we immediately began advancing possible theories to explain the phenomena… and then we remembered – Dad was rubbing the pencil!!  “That’s it!”we reasoned, “Some kinda static electricity thing…”  We grabbed the pencil again, rubbing it up and down and saying, “But how…?”  Dad watched us for a while rubbing the pencil viciously and trying to stick it to things, when he could no longer contain himself and burst out laughing.  The joke was clearly on us.

“Hahahahha…” My Dad was turning red with laughter, and we knew that this was our cue to start feeling dumb. “I Blew the pencil across the floor!” His entire routine was elaborately conceived so that we would ignore the most obvious explanation for what had happened.  If we didn’t buy into the whole ‘string’ thing, we would almost surely buy into the pencil rubbing routine.  Our focus was so distracted from our Dad’s face that we failed to notice or even consider that he was blowing the pencil across the floor! We were forced by deceit into considering evidence that was really very far fetched, and completely beyond the knowledge of the average kid to evaluate.  Thankfully, Dad was kind enough to tell us the truth BEFORE we spent a long and fruitless search into the subtleties of static electricity.

It would be really sad if I had spent my whole life remembering that pencil move across the floor and studying to find the answer, only to end up like some of the people the Apostle Paul spoke about, “Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” -2 Timothy 3:7  Like my Dad in his game, there are plenty of forces in real life that are constantly distracting us from the most important things  to consider.  These demand our intellectual time and investment, and they are so far beyond the scope of the average individual that we are compelled to accept them as true.  Paul warned the church of his time about these things saying, “…avoid profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: Which some professing have erred concerning the faith.” -1 Timothy 6:20-21  You will find in the end that the faith of JESUS is a much better investment than any opposition of science… when you focus on His face you won’t end up feeling dumb in the end.