Chosen by The Strong One

I've been thinking about chosen-ness. I was reminded of it a couple of Sundays ago as the sermon was on Romans 8. I'm particularly fond of the end of the chapter where Paul says nothing will separate us from the love of God that is in Jesus. I've read a bit about quantum physics, and while I barely have enough of a grasp to know how little I actually understand, there are some pretty exciting images built into the fabric of God's created universe that echo that verse.


Quarks are what make up protons and neutrons, the nucleus of an atom. It takes three quarks to make either a proton or a neutron. Two quarks have a special relationship as reciprocals of each other, a third quark completes the set. Quarks are bound by what is called "the strong force." It is one of the four fundamental forces holding the universe together; strong force, weak force, electromagnetic force and gravity. The strong force is, as the name implies, the strongest force, literally the thing that holds the universe together. Every atom in the universe is connected to another atom by electromagnetic force, but every atom in the universe is literally held together, in it's core, by the strong force. We have no idea how the strong force works, what it is, why it's holding everything together, it just is. It brings to mind Augustine, I think it was, who talks of God not just creating the world, but still actively, literally holding it together. Here's the weird thing about the strong force; most forces we are familiar with, like gravity or say magnetic force, weaken at a distance. As you move a piece of metal away from a magnet you can feel the force weaken, as objects move away from the earth the gravitational pull weakens. The strong force, counter-intuitively, gets stronger with distance.

Quarks exist in asymptotic freedom, when they are close together the force binding them tends toward zero, as they move apart the force binding them tends toward infinity. The closer they are together the more they are "one," the further apart they get the more they are bound together as "one," unable to break free of their relationship to each other. A single quark has never been observed on it's own, because the energy required to separate one quark from another is greater than can be produced by the most powerful particle accelerators in existence.

What a great picture of God, The Strong One, holding us in the love Christ. If the more we are pulled away, the stronger he holds us, and if there is nothing stronger than Him, what can pull us away from him?

Stan Grenz really opened up the Trinity for me in talking about the startling reality of what Jesus accomplished in living, dying and rising again; that we have actually been brought into, enfolded within, Trinitarian love of God, through Jesus, by the Spirit. God is passionate dynamic love and we have been chosen, called into that love. We are adopted heirs, actual brothers and sisters of Jesus; we are enfolded into the strong force of love and He won't let us go.

Quarks are also a nice picture of the three-ness, the complete-ness, of the divine relationship we are invited into.

Two-ness is the first iteration of choosing. There is self and other. There is someone beyond me whom I am able to chose. However, that iteration is also a polarity, a reciprocal. Self and not-self. If relationship is a fundamental truth of existence, then A must chose B. The only other "choice" is non-relationship, which is non-existence. Quarks mirror this initial iteration in that a meson—a reciprocal pair of quarks—is always embedded in a set of three quarks.

Three-ness is the first iteration of true choosing. There is self and others. A can chose B or A can chose C. Three-ness brings with it the first possibility for non-choosing; there is the potential for relationship and thus existence along with non-choosing. e.g. A chooses B, there is existence; but does not choose C.

The strength of three comes in a relationship of complete mutual choosing. Fully free and fully bound. This is the wonder and mystery of the Triune God. He is a singularity, and yet he is relationship. He can't be separated out into discreet bits, and yet His very being, His essence, is relationship; dynamic ongoing choosing. The Father chooses the Son and the Spirit. The Son chooses the Spirit and the Father. The Spirit chooses the Father and the Son. Asymptotic freedom, not static banality. Moving, being, fully three, fully one. We have been chosen by and are called into that churning passion, that endless Triune love which conquers all, of which nothing is stronger.