The beautiful. The awful. The heart of man and woman.
We read old things, 100 year old books or 1000 year old stories and we marvel that such simple folks could predict so well the current state of affairs. We are amazed at their inspired writing, that somehow in their primitive state that they could muse about the future so accurately. But it is our own dim arrogance that calls it prophecy. Someone writing about the state of the world all those years ago and yet we can only view our own present sufferings. Things are awful, but that is nothing new. The characters have changed, but their character has not. The details may seem more perverse, but they are not...they are the same...they are the same as Orwell or Shakespeare or Steinbeck or Solomon described. It is beautiful and it is awful. It is the heart of man and woman. There is nothing new under the sun. Things seem bleak, but they wax and wane, build up and destroy. The darkness cannot endure forever though, it is temporary. Hope is more than light in a dark place, it is the very permanence of our universe. It's okay that we can't conceive of it. Hopes existence doesn't rely on our belief. It will prevail because that is it's very nature, the nature of God. God is Eternal, Hope is Eternal, Despair is fleeting. God is Love. Perfect Love drives out Fear.
I take weird comfort in our discomfort...it can only be temporary. Not that it is not awful, it truly is. Many suffer on enormous scale. That's what makes things all the more miraculous when something beautiful can shift the weight of the universe so easily. Something small and sweet can overcome a mountain of misery. It's because the beauty speaks of the Eternal. Even if the bondage of time only allows us a glimpse, it is enough for our souls to recognize home, to see the truth of what things are meant to be and what they will be. To gain Hope. Eternity is more than "a really long time". Eternity is those truest moments made full, absent of the fog of time, Hope fulfilled. Eternity with Christ is an ecstatic gasp that never ends. Awe.
