And now for something completely different: a flower worthy of Dr. Seuss!
At least I think it’s a flower. It’s creative enough to be one. Indeed, if I crudely apply Descartes to this grand debate, I think it’s a flower, therefore it is a flower… is it not? But is that enough to consider, in this day and age when far too many thoughts and decisions are made based simply on what we want the answers to be instead of actually researching and learning what they truly are?
Perhaps it doesn’t matter in this admittedly insignificant case, for my internet connection is running slow and I’m too tired to get up and try to find this thing in my books on flowers, and yet, is there ever a time to relax our quest for the truth?
Oh, but I can hear my distractors yelling, “What is truth?” as Pilate put to Christ.
Our Lord didn’t answer at that time, most likely to keep the historic road to Golgatha on its prophesied timetable, but He had addressed this many times before. The gospel of John raises this issue as early as chapter 1, verse14, noting Christ’s role in creation: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
In John 14:6, Christ bluntly says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” And then there’s John 8:32, where Christ says, “And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
Debaters might consider that insightful, but quite a distance from our subject, this ridiculous plant which I suggest may be a flower. To which I laugh, for to look at this stunning flower… to gaze upon the rain, the clouds, the mountains, rivers, forests seas, and stars… to observe this world and everything in or around it… all this is to see the handiwork of God, made to sustain us as a signpost to Christ.
It is very human to try to name things or classify things and therefore hopefully claim, own, and control these things, but that is an illusion we choose to believe, thinking it thus becomes so. In truth, all of life is God’s creation… beloved, with a purpose. Even this very chaotic, creative flower… and you and I.
Once we remember and accept that truth, and see ourselves as under creation, not over it, then we take a step towards real freedom, and Christ…