Truth, the Blossom
To love the truth is a far greater thing than to know it, for it is itself truth in the inward parts--act truth, as distinguished from fact-truth. IN the highest truth the knowledge and love of it are one, or, if not identical, then coincident. The very sight of the truth is the loving of it.
What is the truth of water?
Is it that it is formed of hydrogen and oxygen? Is it for the sake of the fact that hydrogen and oxygen combined form water that the precious thing exists? Or has God put the two together only that man might separate and find them out? He allows his child to pull his toys to pieces, but wast hat the purpose for which they were made? A schoolteacher might see therein the best use of a toy, but not a father!Find what in the constitution of the two gases makes them fit and capable to be thus honored in forming the lovely thing and you will give us a revelation about more than water, namely about the God who made oxygen and hydrogen. There is no water in oxygen, no water in hydrogen. It comes bubbling fresh from the imagination of the living God, rushing from under the great white throne of the glacier.
The very thought of it makes one gasp with an elemental joy no meta physicist can analyze. The water itself, that dances, and sings, and slakes the wonderful thirst--symbol and picture of that draught for which the woman of Samaria made her prayer to Jesus--this lovely thing itself, whose very wetness is a delight to every inch of the human body in its embrace, this live thing, which, if I could, I would have babbling through my room, this water is its own self, its own truth and is therein a truth of God. Let him who would know the love of the Maker become sorely athirst and drink of the brook beside his path--then lift up his heart to the inventor and mediator of thirst and water, that man might foresee a little of what his soul may find in God. If he become not then as a hart panting for the water brooks, let him go back to his science and its husks, for they will in the end make him thirsty.
Let a man go to the hillside and let the brook sing to him until he loves it, and he will find himself far nearer the fountain of truth than any triumphal chemist at the moment of a great discovery. He will draw from the brook the water of joyous tears, "and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountain of waters."
The truth of a thing, then, is the blossom of it, the thing it is made for, the topmost stone set on with rejoicing. Truth in a man's imagination is the power to recognize this truth of a thing. And wherever, in anything that God has made, in the glory of it, be it sky or flower or human face, we see the glory of God, there a true imagination is beholding a truth of God.
Okay, more to come concerning truth. Any thoughts about this? I'm particularly persuaded that the truth of a thing, indeed, is the blossom of it....its uttermost purpose, what God made it for, etc.
4 comments:
I've been thinking lately about truth in worship. It's so hard for me to sit quietly and sing of dancing and lifting hands to God. I think G,Mac. really touched on the truth in experiencing, in seeing, in expressing the things of the Lord.
The worship leaders tell us to sit then lead us in a beautiful song about dancing for God.
This truth of God invades our lives and changes everything!
Cindy,
I agree and I think George might have had much to say about this scripture concerning worship.
Romans 12
Living Sacrifices
1Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—THIS is your spiritual[a] act of worship.
BTW, I commented on your blog post entitled "Is God Everything?"
This is good Chris. I've been thinking of some related matters about how God is not an object to be dissected so as to better understand him. Rather, God is the ultimate subject.
One of my favorite authors, Peter Rollins, writes:
"God can never be and ought never to be reduced to a mere object for consideration, for in faith God is experienced as the ultimate subject. God is not a theoretical problem to somehow resolve but rather a mystery to be participated in. This perspective is evidenced in the Bible itself when we note that the term 'knowing' in the Hebrew tradition (in contrast to the Greek tradition) is about engaging in an intimate encounter rather than describing some objective fact: religious truth is thus that which transforms reality rather than that which describes it."
I think there is definitely some overlap there between Rollins and MacDonald.
Thanks again for posting these good words from MacDonald (he's still my favorite).
Adam,
Thank you for your comment. Peter Rollins quote is a good one and really adds something here. I'll be interested to see what you think of "Part 2" which is soon to come.
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