“Word Made Flesh”
Greatest Story Ever Told, Greatest Idea Ever Thought
Stories are as old as humanity, but images are as old as the universe. And no image can fuel the imagination like a great idea. And the greatest idea every thought became the greatest story ever told, the story of God made flesh. Yes, “word made flesh” is the best idea known to mankind. It is the eternal idea. And the greatest God is able to make ideas reality. The greatest God doesn’t stay aloof in abstraction but takes root in reality. And that is the difference between God and man, God makes reality while we conform to it. To do so, we let God’s ideas dwell in us.
If we chose other ideas, we conform ourselves to hell. Hell is a life wrapped up in the wrong ideas, forsaking love for lust, truth for lies, and goodness for evil; sometimes even an evil that appears good but is not. The greatest deceptions often creep among us, unnoticed in the chaos and confusion, a fruit that seems appealing but is deadly. A poison injected into something appealing. The symbolism of the old fairy tales endures because they are true.
But what better idea is there than the infinite God being the intimate God? That the creator of the heavens and the earth and all that is in them would also take on human flesh and dwell with us? The perfection of power humbling himself for the sake of love. The supreme authority willing to be obedient to lesser authorities, even if only for a time, to show the supreme graces of his love. If God so loved mankind to become man, truly, there is nothing he won’t do for our good. And that is the greatest story ever told, the greatest idea ever thought. God became man.
And as is true even today, sometimes the greatest stories are the most unbelievable, they are too good to be true and yet are true. At all times, the greatest ideas are the ones that are real. The idea of a unicorn is not so grand as galloping horses across the Patagonia plains. The idea of the great Greek gods is not so tremendous as the true God of the Jews. The greatest ideas are the ones that don’t remain in our imagination but the ones that touch down to the reality of our lives. And the greatest God of all is the one who gives us the greatest story ever told, the story of the love he has for us as evidenced through his Son, who came to dwell among his people.
The greatest designs aren’t the ones that remain on paper, but the ones brought to life. An iPhone as a concept is interesting, but as something tangible, held in the hands and used, that’s beautiful. A romance in the movies is fun to watch, but a marriage experienced and lived with love, that’s amazing. A good God as an idea, that’s something interesting to contemplate, but a true God revealed into the depth of our hearts and dwelling among us, that’s heaven on earth. Our hearts yearn for stories of eternity, forever, everlasting; our hearts long for stories of love and friendship and romance; our hearts yearn for truth; and they will never be satisfied until they reach those yearnings. Only the designer can fill that void. Only the true lover can satisfy our hearts in love. Only God can be the end of life. All else is hell.
And every search for truth must continue to evolve until it finds God and his love. Only then can we come into his rest.