The longing for home is woven into the fabric of the life of every man, every woman, and every child. It is profoundly affected by their inescapable connection to place, persons, and principles—the incremental parts of a covenant community. While the nomad spirit of modernity has dashed the integrity of community, it has done nothing to alter the need for it. Gardens serve to connect us with those places, persons, and principles in remarkable and unexpected ways. This is a notion that wise men and women through the ages—and particularly wise artists, musicians, and writers—seem to have always known. It is part of that spark of genius that makes their work live on long after they themselves have passed on into eternity.
Friday, May 16
Longing for Home
The longing for home is woven into the fabric of the life of every man, every woman, and every child. It is profoundly affected by their inescapable connection to place, persons, and principles—the incremental parts of a covenant community. While the nomad spirit of modernity has dashed the integrity of community, it has done nothing to alter the need for it. Gardens serve to connect us with those places, persons, and principles in remarkable and unexpected ways. This is a notion that wise men and women through the ages—and particularly wise artists, musicians, and writers—seem to have always known. It is part of that spark of genius that makes their work live on long after they themselves have passed on into eternity.
Today I saw a college student's car decorated with the words "Going Home! Yeah! Home!" But, it was with more melancholy words that Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young expressed that desire in "Woodstock"- "... we've got to get ourselves back to the Garden." How sad they didn't realize that we cannot get ourselves back to the Garden. Only through the work of Christ on the cross is that Garden accessible. There is indeed something in all of us that longs for home, for that Garden, where we did find place, person, and principle.
ReplyDeleteThat brings to mind something Lewis said In Mere Christianity, “The man who has settled down to live in the beauty spot will discover gardening.”
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