The earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein
Psalm 24:1
The world is the Lord’s. All of time us under His eternal ever-present dominion. We are in His story.
And we have to remember that, and work from there. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t trials, that there aren’t troubles, that all will be easy.
No, in God’s story, it’s not easy. It’s an epic! I use this not in the loose sense, that it’s “cool”. No! Rather, think of the Iliad, the Aeneid.
Think, if you’re in a more modern mood of the science fiction epics, the movies, the sagas… Then think more. Think deeper. Think everything. Think everything as one in every detail. Every detail.
That’s the world. That’s how I want to see the world. That’s how God, in His perfection, sees the world. In Himself, as one. We see many things, many evils, many accidents throughout world history. We understand a bit of it, perhaps, but don’t get the big picture. History is focused on facts. So is news, journalism, if you’re lucky enough to catch some real journalism. But these are often detached from the bigger picture. Perhaps, in a weird way, Joe Biden was right when he famously gaffed “We choose truth over facts.”
We do! We should. We must. Truth, the truth, more properly the Wisdom (O Sapientia) is who we are to follow and love. Not the particulars for their own sake, but with the end always of the end in mind, that highest Love, the Highest Good, the source of all Truth, God Himself. Deus Ipse.
We are in His order of things.
But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent his Son, made of a woman, made under the law. That he might redeem them who were under the law: that we might receive the adoption of sons.
Galatians 4:4-5
We are in time. We are in His story. We are in His order. Until the end of time. Until we have fulfilled our purpose. And we do have a purpose. That’s why we’re here at all!
As Kingfishers Catch Fire
As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
BY GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying Whát I dó is me: for that I came.
I say móre: the just man justices;
Keeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is —
Chríst — for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.