I opened a box this evening whose contents were wrapped in a plastic bag. I could not but notice the warning printed on the bag to keep it away from children was printed in fifteen different languages.
Languages are fascinating systems of sound symbols which were eventually turned into visual symbols. Speech came before writing. We are symbolic creatures that communicate with each other via a variety of symbols. The words you are reading right now are nothing more than a batch of symbols that we have agreed upon to mean something to us. It is an interesting process of taking a thought from my brain and putting it into your brain. It is superior to a Vulcan mind meld because I don’t have to be near you. I don’t even have to be alive to do it. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John continually put their ideas about Jesus in our minds and they have been dead for almost two thousand years.
We also communicate with each other by our body language. The expressions produced by our eyes and the curvature of our mouths often times speak louder than the words that come out of those mouths. Often we communicate with others who do not know our language by the symbolic gestures of our hands and stance.
Jesus once said, “All men will know you are my disciples if you love one another.” I was vividly reminded of how tricky this can be. Today in class I specifically said, “We show our love for God by how we treat each other.” About two minutes later I verbally sliced up a student who irritated me. As Paul once asked, “Who will deliver me from this body of death?”
Written by Roger Bothwell on February 18,2009
Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574
rogerbothwell.org