Bike Riding and Being Christian
“Banger.” That’s the name we gave to the wee bike I learned to ride on. It has a hand-me-down from friends whose two sons had also learned to ride on it. Needless to say it was a little worse for wear.
Mum didn’t believe in putting training wheels on bicycles. Thinking they were a safety hazard because the bike would tip over if you turned too hard. Never mind the fact that if you couldn’t balance on the bike you were sure to fall off. I gained a few scraped knees in the process of learning.
It was Gillian who taught me how to ride. Gillian was five years older than me and lived up the street from us in number 3. I don’t remember much about the learning process, but I do remember the first time she let me go on my own.
All the other kids in the street were called to come and watch. We set up on the road outside her house and I was going to take a solo ride down the street. I was nervous, but I knew I could do it. I put my feet on the pedal and pushed off. I found my balance and my little legs turned those pedals hard as I flew down the street.
About halfway down it dawned on me that I knew how to ride, but I didn’t know how to stop. Thankfully this thought also came to Gillian’s mind and she took off running down the street to catch me. She got there in the nick of time and I came to a slow stop. There would be plenty of crashes later on as I pushed my “skills” past their limit.
There’s only one way to learn to ride a bike and that’s to get on one and figure it out, usually with the encouragement of someone holding onto you and then running along beside you, before you can then take off on your own.
The English philosopher, Michael Polanyi, writes, “From my interrogations of physicists, engineers and bicycle manufacturers, I have come to the conclusion that the principle by which the cyclist keeps his balance is not generally known.” He continues, “The rule observed by the cyclist is this. When he starts falling to the right he turns the handlebars to the right, so that the course of the bicycle is deflected along a curve towards the right. This results in a centrifugal force pushing the cyclist to the left and offsets the gravitational force dragging him down to the right. This maneuver presently throws the cyclist out of balance to the left, which he counteracts by turning the handlebars to the left; and so he continues to keep himself in balance by winding along a series of appropriate curvatures. A simple analysis shows that for a given angle of unbalance the curvature of each winding is inversely proportional to the square of the speed at which the cyclist is proceeding.”
Polanyi is saying that this theoretical knowledge is of little value when it comes to actually riding a bike. There are so many variables that come into play that it’s impossible to ride a bike based on calculating the mathematical equations involved in staying upright.
Riding a bike is about feeling it. The more you ride the better you become at it.
Too much of Christianity has been reduced to the formulas of systematic theology rather than the sheer joy of living within the story. Right believe rather than right living.
The apostle Paul reminds us that “Knowledge puffs up while love builds up” (1 Cor. 8:1). The problem with puffed up knowledge is it can take up all the space and leave little or no room for love. Like me, you’ve probably known people who work hard at protecting what they think of as orthodoxy (knowledge) at the expense of love.
Being a Christian is about learning how to live into the story of God’s redemptive love that is ultimately revealed in Jesus. This requires having others nearby to steady us as we begin that journey and run alongside us offering encouragement as we gain confidence on the way. The way of love. There will always be much of our faith that remains a mystery and that’s OK.
As a theologian and defender of orthodoxy Augustine would still write that “A man who is resting upon faith, hope and love, and who keeps a firm hold upon these, does not need the Scriptures except for the purpose of instructing others. Accordingly, many live without copies of the Scriptures, even in solitude, on the strength of these three graces.” To be clear Augustine is not dismissing the importance of the Scriptures, rather he’s emphasising the truth that if we live by love then the theories are largely irrelevant.
Even the misinterpretation of Scripture could be tolerated by Augustine as long as it ultimately pointed to love. "If … a man draws a meaning from them that may be used for the building up of love, even though he does not happen upon the precise meaning which the author whom he reads intended to express in that place, his error is not pernicious, and he is wholly clear from the charge of deception." If only we could lean into that in more circles today.
I can ride a bike. I can’t explain the science behind it.
I follow the way of Jesus, the way of love. I’m trying to live as part of God’s redemptive story. I can explain some of it, though I may be mistaken. Certainly my Baptist, Lutheran, Methodist, Catholic, Episcopal friends would have their disagreements with me and that’s just fine.
As Polanyi says, “Rules of art can be useful, but they do not determine the practice of an art; they are maxims, which can serve as a guide to an art only if they can be integrated into the practical knowledge of the art.” Theology has its place, but is no substitute for living our faith in Jesus through our love of God and love of neighbour.
