NURSERY OF LIFE

There is an awesome sight in the night sky at the present in the Southern Hemisphere. From about 8.00pm low on the Eastern horizon (in Australia) appears a large bright star, glowing red. Of course, it is not a star at all, it is in fact the planet Mars. Mars has not been this close to Earth as it is now in August 2003 for 60,000 years. It is an inspiring and majestic sight outshining all the other luminous bodies in the night sky, bar the Moon.

As I stood beholding this wonderful red jewel I was reminded suddenly that we can only see these objects in the sky at night because they reflect the light of the Sun - the star at the centre of our Solar System. And so I pondered the great miracle of light.

We take light for granted. Yet without light we would be in darkness and there would be nothing. Scientists tell us that stars are the nurseries of life; stars that have exploded provide the chemical building blocks for planets and ultimately for biological life and living stars like our Sun provide the light that not only illuminates but also generates.

It is interesting that the opening chapter of John's Gospel
describes Jesus Christ, God's only Son, using the concepts of both Light and Word. Both light and word have the possibility to create. John firstly depicts Jesus as God's Word and then in verses 3, 4 and 5 he says: "All things came into being through him [Jesus], and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being
in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it." John depicts Jesus as the ultimate Word and Light that has created all things and not only that but a certain kind of life with an everlasting dimension, in that this life will not be overcome.

Words can have an incredibly creative power, but inversely they can also destroy. Words, as much as light, can create worlds. The great poet John Keats wrote a poem about the power of words to create reality after he had read Chapman's translation of Homer:

On First Looking into Chapman's Homer

Much have I travelled in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
Round many Western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse had I been told
That deep browed Homer ruled as his demesne;
Yet never did I breath its pure surene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
He started at the Pacific - and all his men
Looked at each other with a wild surmise -
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

William Shakespeare, perhaps the greatest wordsmith of the English language, created worlds of vital living beings. One of his most famous plays is Macbeth. Shakespeare creates a world of darkness, evil and corruption that is as relevant to us today as it was in his time. It is a world that many people lock themselves into. It is a world without hope. It is a world where words are used not to
create but to destroy and it is a world where darkness overcomes light.

You may know the story of that imaginative but villainous Macbeth, who with his equally maleficent wife, gained the Scottish throne by murdering King Duncan during his visit to their castle. Macbeth is influenced by the dark world of witchcraft and so murder follows murder as Macbeth seeks to hold on to his ill gotten throne. Through the whole process, Lady Macbeth goes insane and finally, with his kingdom crumbling around him and as Macbeth learns of his wife's untimely death he says:

"Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow,
a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more, it is a tale,
Told by an idiot, full of fury,
Signifying nothing."

(Act V, Scene V).

But according to the Gospel of John, we do not live in a world of darkness that signifies nothing. In Jesus Christ the Light and the Word have arrived in this world that reflects the heart and mind of God. This Light and this Word creates everlasting life and all who accept this Light and this Word will have life in abundance now and
forever more. The light of the physical world can be extinguished, just as a candle can be blown out or an electric light can be switched off. The stars of the cosmos eventually burn themselves out or explode. But the Light of Jesus, says John, nothing can overcome.

When we take heed the call of God to give our lives to Jesus Christ, we not only reflect his light to others but it lives in is and it transforms us and brings us eternal life. Let us therefore take into ourselves the Light and Word of Jesus Christ. Let Jesus be our Nursery of Life.

- Kim Thoday <thodaykh@ihug.com.au>

____________________________
THE MYSTERY OF THE COSMOS (Jeremiah 31:20)

by Kim Thoday

The big orange sun fell into its hole in the ground. A cool, still, summer evening in the bush. Some leftover solar rays rush around for somewhere to hide, fading into obscurity. Someone is switching on little lights that hang here and there on the immense dome above. A few cicadas begin their strange chorus.

A moment of invitation to the mystery of the cosmos; to watch and partake in the unfolding of a great drama; to contemplate afresh the miracle of existence. The blue-grey canvas above turns into exquisite black velvet offering up an infinite treasure of diamonds.

The distant worlds beckon like ships' beacons in the night. The eternal now extends its slippery palm. Linear time dissolves, as I gaze into the most distant pulsations of light. I recall that I am looking back into aeons of time. From a vantage point somewhere else in the universe, my time, according to general relativity, exists in the future. I am overawed with a sense of wonder. I try to comprehend the experience, but it scurries away.

Something else is happening. Black velvet that cushions millions of brilliant lanterns morphs into trillions of tiny shiny grains of sand. The Milky Way rolls out its thick blanket, revealing yet diffusing more distant galactic layers behind. Deep space continues to yield up its secrets, as my eyes grow accustomed to its hiddenness and as my being attunes to its infinite play.

The infinitude of the universe scares me. Humility, fragility, insignificance, vulnerability, drop like daggers to the heart. Yet I am overwhelmed by grace; by womb-like compassion that has created this wonder and light; this darkness and silence. I am caught in paradox. A moment of acute anxiety. A moment of crucial decision. Meaning or meaninglessness? Hope or hopelessness? God or no God? Ah, faith and doubt.

The Spirit of love and compassion tugs like gravity. A sudden flash of cognition merges with intuition. The wonder and terror of the cosmos only exists because of the gift of consciousness. I think, I feel, therefore the cosmos is.

Physicists such as John Polkinghorn and Paul Davies suggest that scientific study of the universe has increasingly revealed the fingerprints of design. Davies says: 'If one were to accept that, the next question is: to what purpose has God produced this design? The apparent "fine-tuning" of the laws of nature necessary if conscious life is to evolve in the universe then carries the clear implication that God has designed the universe so as to permit such life and consciousness to emerge. It would mean that our own existence in the universe formed a central part in God's plan' (The Mind of God, Penguin, 1992, p.213.).

I stand again in awesome wonder before the God of the cosmos. I offer my praise and thanks to the compassion (womb) of God, who gestated a human consciousness able to participate in the creation of infinite possibilities for life.

Thus says Yahweh: Is Ephraim [Israel] my dear son? my darling child? For the more I speak against him, the more I do remember him. Therefore my womb trembles for him; I will truly show motherly-compassion upon him (Jeremiah 31:20).