Birds Don’t Do It. Bees Don’t Do It. Even Educated Fleas Don’t Do It!
They don’t make meaning. And they don’t worry about dying or suffer anxiety, at least not to the best of our knowledge. We on the other hand, created in God’s image are creative meaning makers. On the outside we do so many things the animals do, except we think about it, a lot! We interpret and anticipate. We hope and dream, we guide and direct our lives. In this world of meaning we are subject to the powers of fear and destruction as we see the world around us suffer the effects of entropy and decay. We know that this flesh is a time-limited opportunity. But by faith, hope and love, we are also able to live and move and have our being on a different playing field. We are able, as the great sages and prophets have always taught, to access the same spirit that brought all things into existence. Though this body may be decaying, we might, with the Apostle Paul, find our inner life expanding exponentially. Yes we are caught up in a drama, much of it of our own composition. In large part we are able to choose the characters and the plot. And with the right spirit, we can choose the outcome. Do we choose to interpret this experience as a tragedy or a heroic odyssey? Will our hero suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and then rise from the ashes, or will he or she suffer and ignominious demise in abject obscurity? As a community of faith we have chosen to elevate a story that turns death into life, as the centerpiece of meaning. If this is the ideal paradigm can we do anything but structure our own existence accordingly? Now we see through a mirror dimly but then we shall see face to face, now we know in part, then our knowledge will be full. Three things remain, faith hope and love but the greatest of these is love. And what I mean to say is, I think I know what he meant.
