Squandered gifts

Suppose you had created the universe.

Suppose you existed as a triune being (I know; it’s hard to picture, but reality continually shows itself stranger than fiction). In other words, three distinct, immaterial persons make up a perfect unity that relates, contemplates, enjoys, upholds, and delights in yourself, continually and eternally. The relationship of the persons within your being is best described as “love.” Though all three receive love to themselves and give love to the others, though all three are equal in honor and permanence and glory, anyone able to look at you would see distinctions. They might be hard to describe—perhaps not individual features so much as facets: smooth surfaces set off at differing angles, like a cut diamond. They flash and sing, these distinctions; without them your glory would be silent and static.

Of course there’s no one to behold you; you’re all that is. But such is the massive energy and dynamism of triune love that it can’t help but create: first, a waiting darkness; then time, then space, then whirling bodies in the great ocean of space-time. It’s all good, because it’s all like you—relational in its very essence. Nothing is alone; every particle is paired, every element acquires its character from chemical bonds. From this living material come rocks and water, stars and atmosphere.

Suppose your creative love hovers over one planet in particular. Elements become compounds and compounds become geography: mountains, oceans, grasslands, forests. You split life into streams: biological, bacterial, botanical, entomological, avian, amphibian, reptilian, mammalian. At the height of this creative ferment, you stoop down and scrape together a pile of dust, saying, “Let us make a creature (a man, an Adam) in our own image.”

All the other creatures are simply spoken into being. The Adam is touched and kissed. He can talk to you, and when you bring him his complement, also carefully shaped by hand, he can speak to her.

What do you mean by “image”? That’s the obvious question, but none of the creatures flipping their tails or flapping their wings can ask it. Asking will be part of the image. Also thinking, wondering, talking, dreaming, and—most of all, perhaps—creating. All the other creatures are simply spoken into being. The Adam is touched and kissed. He can talk to you, and when you bring him his complement, also carefully shaped by hand, he can speak to her.

All earthly creatures receive the same command: Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. You’ve designed a method for that to happen, basically the same for almost all the creatures, but for the Adam it will be as different as assembly directions are from Shakespeare. You’ve created them distinct yet alike: male and female like the other animals, but together for a lifetime, not just a season. The Adam, male and female, are made to relate, contemplate, enjoy, uphold, and delight in each other. They will touch and kiss. Their multiplying will be because of the creative love between them, and father/mother/child will reflect something of the essence of Father/Son/Spirit.

Suppose you created a universe built on love, with a man and woman as the most articulate and intimate expression of that love. Suppose you allowed them to procreate by a means that would drive them to ecstasy and bind them tenderly to each other and eventually produce more images of you.

Now: Suppose they separated that act from your purposes—from you, really—and declared each individual to have sole rights to bodies you designed to be complementary and dependent? Suppose they sanctified every urge, combination, and multiple, even to the exploitation of children and animals? Suppose they made your gift a commodity?

How might you respond?

I hear this all the time: “God didn’t say anything about … [homosexuality, abortion, transgenderism, etc.].” As Paul implies in Romans 1, God didn’t have to say anything about the current obsession—His creation shouts His views. His being, gloriously turning in faceted brilliance, reflects His law. His command is still Be fruitful and multiply my images. Though they are bent and tarnished, He will straighten and shine up a multitude. But don’t insult His being by pretending He doesn’t care what you do with the body He made for His glory.

Email jcheaney@wng.org