The Magnitude of 1

239 souls. Did any one of them have any premonition or even an inkling as they buckled their seat-belts on board MH370 that March 8 2014 would turn out to be a journey of no return, instead of a routine flight to Beijing? The disappearance of an entire plane-load of people has gone down into aviation history as the greatest mystery since 1937 when Amelia Earhart, the first female aviator, vanished whilst attempting to circumnavigate the globe over the Pacific Ocean with her 1-man crew Fred Noonan. Every newspaper front-paged the announcement of the M'sian PM after 17 days SAR efforts that MH 370 had ended in the Indian Ocean. The outpouring of grief went way beyond the affected families shared by a world united in human tragedy. And truly there are no words that can adequately express this kind of heart-wrenching sorrow without closure.

But I couldn't help noticing as I flipped through the pages of the daily I subscribe to, buried deeper in its pages was the news of a 17 year old teenager who was killed in a bus accident on the way back from a leadership camp school trip. On the very next page was a report of yet another fatal accident involving a mom and her 2 toddlers. Further flipping brought news of 6 dead in a fishing boat that caught fire off some overseas island somewhere. The very next day the foreign news section reported a devastating mud-slide in Arlington, Washington USA with initial 8 confirmed deaths and an unknown number of persons missing. And I suddenly recalled mind-numbing stats of 200,000 dead swept away in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. There was a lump in my throat -  1 dead, 3, 6, 8 dead, 200,000 dead, 239 'presumed dead' - the grief in each case, no matter the how, why or wherefore of each different event is the same - it cuts so deep into the human heart it literally and physically hurts. I know because I have been there, up close and personal to death of a dearly beloved spouse. It occurred to me the magnitude of death lies not in the number of body- count  in a single occurrence though numbers do make for spectacular news head-lines, but in its intrinsic horror. Even if it's only 1 dead, it's bad enough.

But there was 1 death which stands out in history as exceptional; its echoes reverberating throughout all time. 1 Man died on a cross meant for common-place criminals, although He was perfectly innocent of any wrong. That was bad enough, but the magnitude of His death wasn't in its horror, although it was indeed undoubtedly horrible. The magnitude of the death of Jesus Christ 2014 years ago was in death's own destruction, swallowed up in His resurrection from the tomb. There can be any number of mysteries, which man's intelligence and scientific advances may solve by the by.  But this one, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, remains uniquely unexplainable. Because like God, it can never be deduced nor understood by human logic; it's meant simply to be believed and received as a blessing of the highest Love. Apostle Paul after pondering the mystery exclaimed, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" (1 Corinthians 55). If only we realized the awesome magnitude of the proclamation of Jesus' last words as He died on the cross, "It is finished" (John 19:30)  It wasn't "I am finished", but 'it' -death, sin, hell, His mission to save the world - is finished, then perhaps more would choose to believe Him that there can be....fantastic good news in the face of something as bad as death. It won't stop the tears or the grief, but it certainly comforts my heart, that I do not need to grieve, as the Bible puts it "like the rest of mankind, who have no hope" (1 Thessalonians 4:13)

Anyone who has gone through the loss of  dearly beloved will know the empty yet acute ache that weighs upon the heart that's beyond description. They say time heals every wound. That's not quite true, at least for me. Time only takes some edge off the pain, but it's always there, for the memories of one who is 'gone' out of sight remain forever embedded in the soul, cemented by something inexplicable called love. To this day 12 years on, I remember my husband with a certain wistfulness. I miss him, I always will on this side of earth. But like the saying goes, life must go on for those still living. I don't mean to be crass or insensitive, but after awhile even as great a mystery as MH370 will no longer make headlines if there are no more new angles to report. It will be superseded by the next 'great' event. Actually we don't have to wait long, even now, interposed within the reports of other local and international tragedies, there are pages of smiling models, latest fashion updates, slimming and cosmetic adverts, movie reviews, sports highlights, and funny cartoons. What a juxtaposition of contrasts.

We laugh and we cry. We rejoice and we mourn. We live and we die. The only difference is for the one who follows Jesus Christ all the way - yes, even to the cross of death - there is something infinitely better beyond to look forward to than even life on earth.

"....And so we will be with the Lord forever..." 1 Thessalonians 4:17
"....thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" - 1 Corinthians 15:57

Which Way Now

The front-page of a national newspaper screamed the above headlines on Day 6 MH 370 disappeared. The whole world knows MH370 by now; MAS has 'retired' the use of the flight no; so there will never be another plane carrying the tag MH370. And doubtless it is everyone's fervent hope there will never be such a tragedy again. I recognize I have no words adequate enough to offer the families who are affected; certainly  expressions of sympathy and empathy are appropriate but can never assuage personal grief in such circumstances. So instead of sharing this or that latest theory, news or whatever, I guess the best thing I can do is just shut up and pray; because it happens to be the only thing I can do.

But I have to confess praying only got me pondering about God instead. Especially since I 'happened' to be reading Philip Yancey's book entitled "What Good is God?" when the news broke. I think God already knew the questions that would arise in my heart, so He's thrown me this book even before I asked them. For that was indeed the number 1 question I struggled with, even as I prayed and continue to pray like thousands of others who do believe there is One who looks from above, who knows all the affairs of man and who is still in charge of the universe. 
Once again I was confronted with age-old dilemmas which other minds much more brilliant than mine have, through the centuries, debated, dissected and disputed over - where is God in the midst of a messed-up world? How can there be a good or loving God who can Not or will Not do anything in the face of so much that is wrong? Why pray when whatever is going to happen is going to happen anyway, with or without God? Why do I still doggedly believe, despite having no or no satisfactory answer? Some people put it down to faith. But arguably, what's the use of faith when things don't get better and instead seem to get worse? Some talk about comfort. But what comfort is there in a silent heaven, despite all the prayers that must be ascending from M'sia daily, whether it's about the drought, haze or MH370, not to mention the prayers of billions all over the world, petitioning for this, that or the other? When I mentioned that apparently the disaster had been prophesied as early as last year, the quick retort by an atheist was, 'Well, so how come your God can't just make the plane appear now and solve the whole problem?" Touché.

What answer can I give, the mere mortal that I am, how would I know why God does or doesn't do certain things? I am not an expert theologian, I don't fancy the study of apologetics; indeed even though I am legally trained, I don't have much patience with intellectual arguments about logic and proof, since I don't need that to believe. But one thing I do know - that  my experience with God over the past 12 years of my life has made me realize how woefully inadequate is my understanding of Him, and how totally unrealistic and self-limiting it is to try to put Him in a box of my own making. I have to constantly caution myself that it's too facile and simplistic to assume that just because God doesn't seem to be 'doing' anything, He doesn't exist, or that if He did, He's not good or great.

I found a glimpse of an answer at a funeral wake, of all places. By the way this was the 5th funeral in less than 2 weeks that I was informed about. That's a lot of deaths, a lot of grief. The pastor recounted how the departed sister who suffered much during her illness never complained, but kept on coming to church, even helping out in ministry, altho her capability was already limited.  It struck me then that death is the reason for my faith.

We humans instinctively don't want to suffer. That's why we always pray to be blessed with 'good' things - health, wealth, no pain, no troubles, peace, happiness, safety. We moan and groan about the 'bad' things that happen in our personal lives, in our society, in the world. Why? Could it be that we all have this in-built 'radar' that consistently responds to good and evil because the original 'plan' for mankind had gone out of whack? God didn't make 'losers, He made man in His image to be blessed, to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over...all the earth" (Genesis 1:26,28). If we would believe the Bible, in the beginning all that was created by God was indeed good; it was only when man sinned that all the 'bad' became his lot  - hard work, toil, sweat, suffering, labor and death.  In other words, because of our own folly, we lost it all. And like wistful losers, we try to recapture what used to be ours. So we cry at funerals not just for the deceased, but for ourselves, because deep inside, we all don't want death. We get angry at injustice and oppression, we balk at pain and suffering, we condemn evil, not only or really because we should, but because instinctively, we 'know' that's not how life was meant to be.

Yet, if there be no God, good and evil would be meaningless, since everyone dies, so what's the big deal?  If there is no heaven or hell, what anyone does or doesn't do in this life won't matter an iota, because we would all end up in a coffin some day.  Why bother being/doing good, and what's so bad about evil then? You can be you, I can be I; we can be free, to each his own, live and let live, till death claims us both. But I don't want to be reduced to insignificant dust or ashes, I am certain I wasn't created to be a mere memory in earth-time. Indeed I have heard of an incredulous promise, declared by a Man named Jesus, 'I am the Resurrection and the Life. The one who believes in Me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in Me will never die" (John11:25-26). Come to think of it, that's what was so good about the original plan of God from aeons ago- man was gifted with eternal life to rule.

And that's why I believe - because it is only God who can hold out such a hope for humankind.  Without this hope of restoration of what we have lost, we are really as good as dead. It is this hope I feel at Christian funerals when pastors always talk about 'a better place'. It is this hope that keeps me praying for a better tomorrow, though it may not happen in my tomorrow.  It is this hope that sees me through crises, sufferings and sorrows of the heart, enabling me to rejoice and be glad everyday, for this is the day that the Lord has made.  It is this hope that assures me I am redeemed and saved from hell despite being the sinner that I am. It is this very hope I harbor deep inside that I will be reunited with my husband the moment I leave this earth forever. It is this fantastic hope that I will see Jesus , Lover and Beloved of my soul, face-to-face on that day. It is this incredible hope that when I meet my Maker, He will be well-pleased with the way I have lived life on earth. 

Not just a wishy-washy, maybe-it-is-or-maybe-it's-not kind of mushy sentimentalist optimism, but a hope  grounded on nothing less than the very real death of a real Person on a cross 2014 years ago. I believe... because Jesus didn't stay dead, therein lies the foundation of the Christian hope. Let mockers, cynics and skeptics sneer all they want. After all, as Apostle Paul put it, "... if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile.... If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied..."(1 Corinthians 15:17,19), as he went on to assert, "But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead" (1 Corinthians 15:20). I find it amazing that Paul, a brilliant learned scholar, amongst the best of his times, who started out persecuting the followers of Jesus, who wasn't an actual eye-witness of His resurrection, can upon his conversion, declare with such certainty and assurance the corner-stone of Christianity - that Jesus Christ rose from the dead, an issue which will forever be the point of contention that divides the believer and non-believer.  

So what good is God? In his book of the same title, Yancey writes about his encounters with all kinds of people - Virginia Tech campus kids who lived through the 2007 massacre where 33 people were gunned down senselessly, pastors who are routinely imprisoned for their faith in certain countries (and take it as a badge of honor) , prostitutes who want to get out of a lifestyle that provides money but no peace, slum communities who can still create a place to worship God in the midst of the abject squalor and disgusting filth of their surroundings, persecuted Christian minorities in certain nations who continue to live out their faith, doing good to their 'enemies' despite knowing they and their entire families could be tortured or killed any time, coloreds forgiving their white-skinned tormentors in public confessions in a nation's reconciliation process....all provoking real-life stories that point to 1 common strand - hope in the face of hopelessness. Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky who penned the classic Crime and Punishment had this to say, "To live without hope is to cease to live". Martin Luther King, facing the reality of social inequality, said, "We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope". Yancey turned the tables around very neatly by asking the question, "What good is no God?"  

Indeed, what good is life, no matter how wonderful, if there is no god? I guess that's why I still believe and will continue to believe in a God who offers the only way out of the futility of life and finality of death - a hope of restoration and redemption. Quoting ex-President Franklin Roosevelt, "We have always held to the hope, the belief, that conviction that there is a better life, a better world beyond the horizon". That's exactly how the Bible ends - with a promise that there will be another time, another place, "a new heaven and a new earth.. where there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain..."(Revelation 21:1,4). There has to be; otherwise Jesus would have died in vain, and all Christians would rightly be called fools. But as much as no one appreciated (nor can anyone ever understand) what 'good' there was as Jesus hung dying on the cross on that long-ago Friday, when throughout the whole of Saturday, nothing 'good' happened, but on the third day, when all human hope was gone, eternal hope resurrected; and the world was never the same again after that Sunday. Where some see a hopeless end, others can see an endless hope....

When I look to the cross and the tomb of Jesus Christ, I find hope that springs eternal because both are empty. Death has been finally and forever vanquished. I can never lose when I believe the One who has already won the victory. Praise God for that blessed Hope. 

"That is why we labor and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all people, and especially of those who believe"... 1 Timothy 4:10

More Than Just....

Such a basic thing, so essential to human survival. Precious water. According to Wikipedia there are 16 dams in 14 states of Malaysia, 13 lakes in 5 states, 58 rivers in West M'sia and 28 in East M'sia. We are surrounded by seas of water... there is the South China Sea dividing Peninsular/East M'sia, the Andaman sea in the north, Straits of Malacca and Straits of Johor in the south, as well as the Sulu and Celebes seas off Sabah. Water water everywhere, and we are facing a protracted water shortage crisis which has seen dry taps in some areas in the Klang Valley for 2 weeks. 2 weeks is an awfully long time to go without something as basic and essential as water, especially in this current heat. Some 2 million M'sians are now having to suffer the inconvenience of water rationing according to a 2 days on, 2 days off schedule which will stretch over a month and likely to be extended. To top it all, the haze is back blanketing our skies with a vengeance. As usual, after blaming this, that or the other, all we can do is sit and wait for the winds to blow it away.

Actually we are not alone. The (so-called) most developed and most powerful nation in the world is facing a water problem in much worse proportion. As of 2012 the US was experiencing its widest-spread drought in 56 years, with 55% of continental US in moderate to extreme drought. CNN that year reported that more than 1000 counties in 26 states were declared a natural disaster areas, meaning it has suffered severe drought for 8 consecutive weeks. And by all accounts what started in 2012 isn't over, as at Feb 2014, 91% of California - the state which grows the most vegetables - is in severe/exceptional drought with parts of the big US of A still in the moderate to extreme drought categories.

For all of humankind's advances in science and technology, it takes just a parched earth to remind us we aren't in fact all that great. Sure we can 'seed' some chemicals into clouds to 'force ' rain to fall. But hey, guess what, we still can't 'make' a teensy-weensy whiff of a rain cloud. From the little I remember of my high school science, there are clouds and there are clouds - only particular types bring rain. Science can produce all the chemicals needed for cloud-seeding, but it can't recreate the specific original raw material needed for rain - a particular fluffy little piece of 'cotton wool' floating in the air. Despite all our sophisticated knowledge of what a cloud is and even how it is formed, we still can't 'do' it. So our weathermen waits for that elusive Cumulus cloud to materialise out of thin air (something which obviously only the Creator of heaven and earth can fashion)....and M'sians buy more pails to store water.

Yet we are ever so proud of the monuments we build to honor ourselves. We congratulate and pat each other on the back as if we are the greatest inventors and innovators of the world and all that's in it. But we fail to acknowledge the One whose Hands fashioned the arch of our eyebrow, the dimple on the face, the curve of our smile, the shape of our fingers and toes, suited to a particular special individual on a case-by-case basis, making each one of us  a unique person in the midst of the 7+ billions on this earth. All our grand achievements may be well and good, but I am reminded of Shelley's famous sonnet on a piece of sculpture found in the desert sand, composed of 2 vast trunkless legs of stone and a half-sunk shattered visage, whereupon a pedestal is engraved "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings; Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" to which the poet fittingly concludes, "Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away..." - the irony of an empty boast.

So much for humankind who presume to exalt ourselves and our works. All our boastings, all our doing, all our posturing about our own cleverness..we are the proverbial empty vessels making the most noise. And all go silent when we file past a little box called the coffin. We think it's the scientist, the doctor, the surgery, the medication that's extending a life, but we can't guarantee how long 'we' can make it last. I hear there is now something called cryopreservation, where dead people are in effect deep-frozen at very low temperatures in the hope that  future medical advances will make resuscitation possible. There is even a process called 'de-extinction' where scientists are hoping to 're-create' extinct species of animals like the great wooly mammoth, using genome technology. So what, dead is still dead for all intents and purposes.

We can know so much about babies and diseases, but we can't programme even one little babe's growth into a perfectly healthy adult. We can try to postpone death but we could be here 1 minute, and gone in the next blink of the eye. Sure, we can produce clones, but no matter how perfect the duplication, we can never beat the original, as we are not the Originator. After all, there can only be 1 real Mona Lisa, painted by 1 real Leonardo Da Vinci. How audacious that finite man presumes to be able to control life's mysterious workings according to our own circumscribed knowledge. We reduce God to a philosophical question mark. But we are forever playing 'little gods', tinkering in the laboratories of our minds, sitting on thrones of our own making, feeding our own pets of independence and freedom. Who are we fooling? Certainly not (the real, one and only living God). Heck, like I said, we can't even conjure up a rain cloud or a wisp of wind.

Yet, we are considered "fearfully and wonderfully made" (Psalm 139:14). That's an amazing statement, for if I am so 'made', there must be a Maker who takes a lot of care in the making of 'me'. And I am not talking about my mum and dad. The real me is more than a combination of my parents' genes, as much as Mona Lisa is more than random splashes of paint on a canvass. To know that I am created by Someone who has 'me' on His mind does something to my heart. Like someone puts it, science can explain the 'what' of life, but it can never explain the 'why'. Sure, we can all find (lots of) hope, meaning, even love, in a life without God, but we would never know what we are missing if we just stop short there. 

The Bible tells the story of a born-cripple sitting daily in front of the temple gate as 2 of Jesus' disciples passed by. For umpteen years, he's been there, begging for alms. But on that day, along comes Peter who tells him to look up, and instead of dropping coins into his hands, like everybody else, he declares, " Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk" And a cripple gets more than he ever expected or desired in his life, as his once-dead legs come alive .(Acts 3:1-8) . Short-sighted beggars that we are, we can only think of  just 'coins, silver or gold ' in our hands and the hope of such to come....when God wants to give us so much more....more than just rain, more than just a mortal life, if only we would 'look up'.

I am not content with having 'just'... - I want the 'more'.

“In the beginning, Lord, You laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands. They will perish, but You remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But You remain the same, and Your years will never end".... Hebrews 1:10-12

The state of California, which produces the most vegetables in the U.S, is going through its worst drought ever, with 91.6% of the state experiencing severe to exceptional drought. 2013 was its worst year ever and there has been no improvement so far in 2014. According to CNBC, it is being projected that California farmers are going to let half a million acres of farmland sit idle this year because of the crippling drought. Much of the western U.S. has been exceedingly dry for an extended period of time, and this is hurting huge numbers of farmers and ranchers all the way from Texas to the west coast.”
Read more at http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/2014/February19/192.html#pZQLi6vj4mlmIIUP.99

The state of California, which produces the most vegetables in the U.S, is going through its worst drought ever, with 91.6% of the state experiencing severe to exceptional drought. 2013 was its worst year ever and there has been no improvement so far in 2014. According to CNBC, it is being projected that California farmers are going to let half a million acres of farmland sit idle this year because of the crippling drought. Much of the western U.S. has been exceedingly dry for an extended period of time, and this is hurting huge numbers of farmers and ranchers all the way from Texas to the west coast.”
Read more at http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/2014/February19/192.html#pZQLi6vj4mlmIIUP.99

“The state of California, which produces the most vegetables in the U.S, is going through its worst drought ever, with 91.6% of the state experiencing severe to exceptional drought. 2013 was its worst year ever and there has been no improvement so far in 2014
Read more at http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/2014/February19/192.html#pZQLi6vj4mlmIIUP.99

Everything is Awesome...really?

Bricks and more bricks. Blocks and more blocks. Apparently close to 4 million unique bricks were used in the Lego Movie to create a virtual Lego world. Man, that's a lot of bricks, even if it's all computer animated. And an amazing sight it was, watching all those little pieces literally come alive on a giant cinema screen, carried off into the comic adventures of a nondescript, perfectly average, ordinary construction worker named Emmet who gets mistaken for the "most talented, most interesting, most special person in the universe", tasked to save the world from destruction by an evil, brain-washing dictator who rules from a high tower, so-o reminiscent of Sauron's Tower in Lord of the Rings. It was a literal roller-coaster ride of funny gags, cleverly parodied by some of the most diverse real and reel characters ludicrously thrown together as a team of "Master-Builders" - Batman, Abraham Lincoln, William Shakespeare, Wonder Woman, Ninja Turtles, Dumbledore and the 2002 NBA All-Stars. It even threw in a Pirates of the Caribbean ship and a Star Wars space-craft to boot. One reviewer termed it "conceptually audacious, visually astonishing and startlingly sophisticated" - it's that good. Not to mention it featured a catchy tune repeating the tag-line Everything is Awesome so many times it sticks in your head and will have you humming on as you leave the hall.

Indeed it's a feel-good movie with something for everybody from kids to adults. And its got a universal theme that speaks to all of us 'ordinary people', whose lives are probably a lot like Emmet's; very often  reduced to a daily grind of following standard 'instructions' (eat, sleep, work, eat, sleep, work) with nothing much to look forward to  - the meaninglessness of life where tomorrow is the same as yesterday and the day before. That's how it can get in the real world too. And just as Emmet is 'happy' with his condition, we too can be happily unaware that there can be another way to live. It's easy to go thru life, just trying to 'fit in' to be like one of the 'regulars'. But somewhere in his peg-head brain, Emmet, despite being so 'generic as to be indistinguishable', is vaguely aware of something missing from his life.

We too may go for years believing this earth is all the life we get to live. But we were never designed to be just 'ordinary' people. God isn't ordinary, and if we accept that we are beings created in His image, surely we are not meant to be ordinary. Something in the deepest part of me tells me I am not just like any other 'animal', born to 'just' live, let live and then die. There must be something  more than a good or great life on this earth; otherwise like the wisest king on earth Solomon declared, "Meaningless, meaningless! Utterly meaningless. Everything is meaningless!" (Ecclesiastes 1:2) We can pretend, even believe, we are ok. But sooner or later, the heart feels a certain wistfulness that comes when we pause long enough to lift up our eyes from our so-smart gadgets we can't live without these days to behold the glory of a sun-set, or tune out of our Spotify play-list to catch the sound of (real) birds chirping outside the window. I call those moments of awakening, when the heart stirs with a certain hope and yearning for a life beyond the mundane....when something extra happens, and a new dimension invades the ordinary.

That moment came when our hero stumbles upon the piece of resistance which identifies him as the special someone from an ancient prophecy of a blind wizard who would save the world from extinction. A more unlikely hero there never was, as the movie totally overturns the normal run-of-the-mill concept of what a 'super-hero' should be. Emmet's way out of the league of smart Master builders, his brain is literally a void, "so prodigiously empty" he's never had an original thought apart from the totally dumb and pointless idea of building a double decker TV couch for non-existent friends. But he does become a hero who saves the day when he believes he can be that 'someone special'. He didn't turn into a smartie-pants strong-man, neither was he given any magic hammers to wave around. He was still Emmet, but a different Emmet. The delicious irony of it all comes in the confession of the wizard's ghost who pops up to tell Emmet, "The only thing anyone needs to be special is to believe that they’re special...The prophecy’s made up. But it’s also true. You can still change everything."

Believe. Such a potent word. We can believe or disbelieve anything or anyone, and the consequences can be literally life-saving or self-destructing. It's either the catalyst that frees you to soar like an eagle or the chain that ties you down to a prescribed life within your own defensive walls. Emmet had  a choice - to believe he was hopelessly ordinary or gloriously extraordinary.  Likewise God brings us to a point when we have to decide whether or not to believe we are no more than a string of body cells amassed together to exist for a certain number of years the best we can, living out our own (pathetically limited - compared to God's) dreams and desires. Or we believe He exists and has a fantastic plan for each one of us, way beyond anything we can ever imagine. We can dismiss Him as unnecessary - all 'made up' like some mumbo-jumbo prophecy -  and go our own way into an ordinary (good) life, or believe we are indeed meant for better things - a life extraordinary grounded in an extraordinary God, who came that we "might have life, and...have it more abundantly" (John 10:10)

Emmet found freedom in daring to believe a prophecy, even though it was rhymed-up rubbish. Jesus came as the prophesied Messiah who would save the world. People then and now still think that's rubbish too. But if we dare to believe Him, His promise is "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:32). Perhaps we don't (want to) believe because we don't dare to take God at His word. We don't really want to know the truth about ourselves or about God, and so settle for a lie, that we are perfectly fine living perfectly ordered (and ordinary) lives. Someone astutely observed that many people choose not to admit there is a God because if we did, then we would be forced to face up to (and change) ourselves, which is  something our human nature automatically rebels against, because we'd rather believe that you are ok, I am ok, everybody is ok (only God is not ok). The saying goes, There is none so blind as the one who will not (not cannot) see. Jesus talked about people who, "though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand....ever hearing but never understanding,... ever seeing but never perceiving" (Matthew 13:13-14)

I guess it's so much easier to remain in the comfortable cave of familiarity and 'safety' , where everything can be explained away, deduced by and reduced to human logic instead of venturing out to leap over the cliff of doubt. Heck, I have done my time peering over it, wondering if there really is a God who will bear me up should I jump off. But despite my faithlessness, He has proven Himself true because every time I dared to take that jump into the unknown, He has always caught and borne me up to fly. Unlike Emmet, I can't even save myself, much less save the world. But one thing I can do - believe that God exists, that He loves me and He wants way better for me than the best I can ever want for myself. That belief leads to perfect freedom, where truly and really, everything is awesome....all because I believe Him.

"And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him." Hebrews 11:6