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| The Journey to Mystery |
Fear of the unknown deeply imbeds my life struggle!
Wanderer’s sunset jogs inexorably towards wests horizon, to set, leaving either the glow of reflected light or flat dullness and drab.
Western culture prods me to reign in thoughts of the ‘D’ word. Rather, distracting with neon thin, hedonistic, frenetic, party-seeking pleasure quests, digital or otherwise...tempts with myriads of ‘joy toy’ alternatives. Just get me to the next slot machine, race day, sports event, jazz or blues bar, favorite magazine or spiritual seminar!
Anything, please, whatever...anywhere...just not toward pondering burrows deep.
Fun filled diversion and rest bring indispensable balance, but when distraction becomes intractable obsession, dissonance...our only melody track, incessant noise or visual pollution obscuring any thought of depth, the soft voice inviting the accosted crusted soul grows muted.
Life is mystery...death a curse!
Life beyond death...greater mystery.
Is there anything after my personal sun sets, or just the nihilistic view that life consists of nada, eternal darkness the destination where my DNA is swallowed and enveloped into nothingness as prescribed by many eastern mystics?
Admittedly, at times I wander along doubts wet trails, sometimes slipping.
When considering life after life a possibility, I contemplate various aspects of my earthly surroundings and am drawn toward cadmium yellow chinks scintillating through purple dark.
In my life as an artist the natural world presents daily visual scores setting my heart racing and toes keeping pace. Each autumn brings glimpses that spring and summer follow the deadness and cold of winter.
What? Dah!...of course spring follows winter! So what!
Recalling decades of years struggling through depression, I seriously came to doubt if leaves would ever return in spring. Yet, despite what seemed interminable months of black opaque, there they came, green translucence of filtered hope, repeatedly each May!
Natures stage opens...black tie platters present annual four-act plays. Flood lights come up on green birthing of innumerable actors...life’s roles play their high summer sky show-off parts...autumn tops off with cherry jubilee celebrations to life’s success...then with winters death, curtain falls...light fades to black...the gathered leave...the orb circle sets...light to follow dark...to follow light...to follow...
"Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can't see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being. So nobody has a good excuse." Romans 1:20 (The Message)
So, okay, in the natural world, death follows life...life follows death, seeds are planted, die, germinate again. Surely that doesn’t give rational reason toward belief that I will in reality inhabit a promised new redeemed body, joining together throughout eternity with others whose faces I know and to whom I am known, involved in highly creative projects of joy and fulfillment far beyond human imagination.
This sounds like very good news indeed...but...
A metaphor recently swooped in, lit on my wandering mind, and began pecking away with deliberation as to the possibility of this Christ promised afterlife.
Macro-lens thoughts zoomed on sperm and egg and their ensuing journey of growth together into previously unknown discovery.
Fusing deep in veiled drape, mysterious duplication entwine woven pathways, layer over layer, toward new life’s tapestry, fully unique, one of a kind among billions.
Hiding deep in black inks darkness without cognition, there it lives, nine gestational watery months. Ultimate tapestry’s exacting sequence knitted...embryonic embroidery...bathed in Creator’s image...by Creators hand. Even pain of imperfection due to humankind’s tragic trip up, offers glimpses of the Father’s face and care.
Warm in watery womb, it could be transported at 30,000 feet crossing vast oceans with all the grandeur of earths offerings streaming by...oblivious.
Hiking high mountain trails, conveyed on motherhood, yet experiencing neither magical vistas nor honey fragrances proffered by wild blooms, only skins dimension beyond. Water laps summers shore while feathers red sing lovely tunes...unaware...shades tightly drawn. Floating lazily above Caribbean turquoise, neon fish dart corals pink...all unseen.
The baby is there, alive, becoming, yet unaware of what’s just beyond...one dimension removed!
Signals shout...gestations done...full orbed emergence screams passage through births canal toward life’s new light.
Reality...red paper thin...life-altered dimension becomes actualization.
Warm recollection of recent climes sends cries for comfort nine months known, unsure the new. Inexorably in time, eyes widen...endless possibility focus...vast freedoms explore wonders unbelieved.
Ideas of heaven are culturally diminished to sad little expressions of riding fluffy floating cotton balls while mindlessly picking six-string harps. If that is heaven, imagined by advertisers of cream cheese et-al, then it doesn’t do much for this boy!
“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
Nor have entered into the heart of humankind
The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”
1 Corinthians 2:9
This, one of several pitons of hope, driven into life’s craggy precipice is where I often cling. Hanging, swaying at times, while winds of doubt assail, he who makes the promise, climbs aside with spikes of faith, helping me swing out and over toward the next foothold to climb yet again. Leaning back, faith anchored strong with carabiners connected, hammered into cleavage deep, despite misgivings.
Jesus, in His claim of divinity, promises something far beyond the present! He promises far more than returning to the hopelessness of pantheistic eastern thought that presents the viewpoint that I will just return from light to become a dissolving strand of DNA into a vast cosmic sea, melding with everything into one faceless entirety.
He promises revolutionary extensions of the uniqueness of my image, my face, reflecting His, stretching into the vastness of a very formed eternity. He promises mind-blowing existential opportunities so far beyond what I now see as reality, defying comprehension. Any joy filled activity here, multiplied exponentially with multiple dimensions of new possibilities added to the mix.
I’m given minuscule glimpses of future wonders to come by receiving tastes of intimacy through authentic warm relationships here and now and uncounted varieties of designed awe. Eternal freedom to enjoy each other, His creation and Him without loss and brokenness is the ultimate promise of completeness.
Eden regained. Shalom restored!
During my short sojourn here on this little cerulean planet, I’m still dark in the womb, seeing hints only of what’s to come...but hints, nonetheless!
Rumours of a further world reinforce my days as I ruminate and attempt to give impressions with paint, the grandeur of myriad signs, revealed and renewed constantly in the natural world.
Rumours of a further world reinforce my days as I ruminate and attempt to give impressions with paint, the grandeur of myriad signs, revealed and renewed constantly in the natural world.
Until I breathe my last assigned breath here and travel the dark ‘D’ tunnel toward that long rumored dimension beyond the darkness I cling on to this nailed hope by provided faith.
Soli Deo Gloria
J. Douglas Thompson...SDG
Copyright 2011
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| Afterglow...Baie Ste. Paul, Charlevoix, Quebec, Acrylic on Canvas |
