Set to hit mailboxes in February, Issue 24 of  The Mockingbird magazine is available to pre-order.

Someone is missing, and we don’t know where. Someone has committed a crime, and we don’t know who. The famed filmmaker David Lynch once described the allure of such setups: “A mystery is a HUGE THRILL. That there’s more going on than meets the eye is a thrilling thing.” In a 2005 book surveying his life’s work, Lynch explains, “A mystery is like a magnet. Whenever there is something that’s unknown, it has a pull to it. If you were in a room and there was an open doorway, and stairs going down, and the light just fell away, you’d be very tempted to go down there.”

Mysteries are things to be inhabited and explored — check all the dark corners for clues. If the writer is playing fair, everything will add up in the end. But until that grand denouement, when all the pieces slide into place, you have a puzzle on your hands. You’re held in suspense until the full picture is revealed. 

To the perplexing puzzle of existence, Christianity posits an answer — albeit, in itself, a mysterious one. The Answer has a fleshly body, is born into grime and obscurity, dies the death of a criminal, and rises, miraculously, to new life. What do we make of this strange revelation, what Paul coins “the mystery of Christ”? Of this Answer, who is at once an emphatic yes to all of God’s promises, but who also leaves us with more questions to ask? He resounds through history into the minutiae of daily life while remaining a cosmic ineffability; he is a merciful, ever-present companion whom we sometimes suspect is not there at all. The mystery of God, in this sense, can feel less like a thrill than a problem. It often skirts uncomfortably close to confusion or obstruction — a curtain beyond which we’re not permitted to see. 

In these pages, we go right up to that curtain. We try, with God’s help, to pull it back. Collaborating with contributors from a variety of backgrounds and fields of expertise, we aspire to offer a glimpse of the cosmic goings-on. With the theologian Ben Despain, we discuss whether such a metaphorical curtain exists at all — spoiler: Despain thinks not. We talk about the everyday mysteries of grief, illness, pregnancy, and magic shows. With Sarah Hinlicky Wilson, we dive into the peculiar religious life of the Queen of Crime, Agatha Christie. Former Mockingbird editor Ethan Richardson makes a triumphant return with an essay about that classic glass-eyed Lieutenant Columbo. We also have the privilege of publishing a stunning folio of four poems by the Pulitzer Prize-winning former Poet Laureate of the United States, Charles Wright — all gifted to us from his own typewriter. In interviews, the philosopher James K.A. Smith lays out a warm, capacious definition of mystery, while author and therapist Kobe Campbell discusses the mysterious process of emotional and mental healing. And that’s just the beginning. With essays by Kate Lucky, Todd Brewer, Adam Morton, Lynda Kong, Dave Nienhuis, Bruce Shaw, Joshua Burdette, Arthur Aghajanian, and poetry by Cole Arthur Riley, John Casteen, Julie Moore, Brian Volck, and DS Martin, this is one of our most packed issues yet. 

From every angle we can think of, we explore the mystery of faith: how it succors, how it vexes, how it signifies God’s majesty, and how God comforts us in spite of life’s ever-present mysteries, which can feel cruel to the sufferer needing a Word from on high. The denouement is never underwhelming — but always thrilling. 

To quote David Zahl, from the sermon which serves as this issue’s closer, “God is not a puzzle to be solved.” God is, however, a light that shines in the dark. So have no fear. The basement door is open. The dark is waiting. — The Editors

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Listen to the Issue 24 playlist on Spotify

To tide you over while you wait for the issue, check out our issue-themed playlist, with tunes by Bee Gees, Flea, Sunny War, Madison Cunningham, Moby, and many others.

 

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