"Everything happens for a reason" should be changed to just "everything happens." But you can find meaning in nearly anything. I certainly don't think God or Satan make things happen according to some divine or dastardly plan. Read the local paper or watch the evening news and tell me that some benevolent and also all-powerful God is controlling everything. The God I worship is certainly a big and benevolent God. But all-powerful? From what I see if He's all-powerful then He must not be very benevolent. I'll take "benevolent". I'm more in the need of the love than the power. On the other hand if Satan is in control, with all the good in the world he's not doing a very good job either. If you maintain that everything happens for some good reason, you are setting yourself up for a lifetime of frustration and disappointment. Things happened the way they happened because that's the way they happened.
With that said I also think that you can assign meaning to nearly anything. Seemingly meaningless events can become quite significant. All you have to do is pay attention. And think about it.
This morning I was looking at the hummingbird feeders out our kitchen window hoping, as you would imagine, to see a hummingbird. Today, like the last several days, my observation was not rewarded. They will be back, but for now they're mostly gone. But as I stood there I noticed a leaf fluttering to the ground. There was nothing unusual or remarkable about the leaf or its descent. It slowly floated in a zig-zag from the tree to the ground like leaves do. It's just that I noticed it. Then it occurred to me that no one else in all of recorded history will see that leaf fall. It wasn't just a once-in-a-lifetime event. It was a once in the history of mankind event. I will never see that leaf fall again and neither will anyone else. So did it mean anything? Only if I allow it to.
As is so often the case with me, that event reminded me of something else that happened many, many years ago.
I was sitting in an IHOP near Oklahoma City. It was one of those a-frame IHOPs like they all used to be. I was with a group of young people traveling back home to Alabama from an incredible week in Telluride, Colorado. I'll just leave it at that. It was on several different levels a marvelous week. It wasn't just me. Ask anybody on that trip. If I started I don't know where I could stop.
So as I was eating my pancakes there was a family across the room in my line of vision. There was a mom and dad and three kids. The kids looked to be about 7ish, 3ish and less than a yearish. The three year old boy was holding the string of a helium filled balloon that was suspended above his head. None of the family and, as far as I know, no one else in the restaurant saw what happened next. As I continued to look, the little boy handed the string to his little sister who was sitting beside him. She was in a high chair at the end of the table. She held the string for a few seconds and then she let it go. Her eyes and her brother's eyes followed its ascent until the balloon rested in the apex of the ceiling. At first neither spoke. But as they continued to crane their necks the little boy pointed skyward and exclaimed, "She dropped it! She dropped my balloon. Way up there!" She never uttered a sound. I looked at the family expecting them to share in my utter delight. I expected them or someone at my table to laugh with me and enjoy the moment. To my amazement nobody saw it. They didn't see the pass or the "drop". They didn't hear what the little boy said to his sister. They just continued to eat and talk as if nothing had happened.
Had something happened? A baby girl had dropped her brother's balloon. Only if you drop a helium balloon it goes up instead of down. A helium balloon is lighter than air. If you let it go it will float away. That's just the nature of helium balloons. That was that. Something happened, but it probably didn't mean anything.
That was nearly 40 years ago. If it didn't mean anything then why did I think about it this morning? Can there be any possible relationship between the random descent of a leaf in October of 2015 and the accidental accent of a helium balloon in June of 1976? What do these two events have in common? They have me in common. Both times I was there. If I hadn't been looking for a hummingbird this morning then I wouldn't have seen the leaf fall. If I hadn't have been looking at that little boy's balloon then I wouldn't have seen his sister drop it. I wouldn't have heard what he said to anyone who was listening. The leaf would have fallen and the balloon would have risen had I not been looking.
But I was looking.
So like I say, not everything happens for a reason. But you can find meaning in nearly anything. Any time Jesus said "The Kingdom of God is like..." He continued with some seemingly meaningless thing like a seed or insignificant person like a child.
You want to see the Kingdom of God! ? Look around. You're standing in it. It will never get any more meaningful than this. You want to know what incredible thing happened today? You did. You'll never happen again. In the history of mankind you will never happen again. Who's watching? God's watching. And He's delighted beyond words.
No comments:
Post a Comment