On Imagination
In the quiet of the afternoon with both siblings snoozing away upstairs, my two “big boys” padded over to the couch. Noah carefully covered Sam with a blanket, then dragged his own blanket to his spot and snuggled in for a favorite pastime that they come by honestly: settling in with a good book.
Today’s selection? Sam and Noah originals, starring Sam, Noah, and their favorite stuffed animals, complete with illustrations, that they wrote earlier this morning amid the sounds of dinosaur pancakes sizzling on the griddle, baby sister squeals, and little brother and his cars racing underfoot. They’d tell you it’s not easy for an artist to concentrate around here! Their mommy and daddy can relate.
I couldn’t help snapping a picture as they told each other their stories with such sincerity and expression. Watching their imaginations come alive has been one of the most beautiful gifts of being a parent. We treasure their imagination as just that—a true gift from God—and intentionally cultivate it in hopes that they will carry it until they are old and gray. Because it is only through that gift of imagination that they can know God and understand their place in his Great Story.
Imagination is not a triviality of childhood, afforded by immaturity and lives sheltered from the harsh realities of this world. On the contrary, imagination is essential to our life in Christ, giving us the eyes to see the things in this universe that are the Most Real, True, Good, and Beautiful. It is through imagination that we can live and work and love and mourn and rest as though the “kingdom of heaven is at hand” in the midst of plagues and coups and division and a hurry-up pace of life and sinful patterns that linger in our own hearts. It takes imagination to set our hopes on the deepest, truest, not-yet-fully-realized reality that, in Christ, “everything sad is coming untrue,” that all that is broken will be put back together, that God’s good creation will someday groan no more, that these bodies of ours will be raised to new life in his kingdom, that our King Jesus will “reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.”
It takes imagination, like Mary when the angel revealed the role she would play in God’s story of redemption, to ask with wonder, “How can this be?” and then confess, “I am the Lord’s servant. Be it unto me as you have said.”
Let’s reclaim imagination for all of us world-weary grown-in-Christ. Let’s spur each other on with good and true stories, rooted in what will last, no longer with us and our favorite stuffed animals as the main characters, but with Christ and his redeeming work at the center. Together, let’s consider what is meant by our King’s words, “Surely I am coming soon,” and how we can echo with our very lives, “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!”