HUMANKIND

Psalm 8: 1-9; Ephesians 2: 1-7

During our trip to Germany and Italy in November, I noticed a number of copies, in Italian or English, of the original story of Pinocchio, written by a man named Carlo Lorenzini whose pen name was Carlo Collodi, the last name being that of his mother’s home town. Collodi was born and died in Florence. Walt Disney toned down some of the painful encounters of the puppet turned boy, but the original story has to do with a wooden puppet that was made by a woodcarver, and in the imagination and fantasy of the author the puppet longs to be real; to be human; to be, as Disney’s version put it “a real boy.” Yet when he was magically transformed into a real boy, he got into trouble, he lied, he learned, and he developed a conscience- a little like what happened when God made men and women in the beginning according to Genesis 2 and beyond. In literature, however, there are fairy tales about mermaids wanting to be human, puppets wanting to be human, robots developing human characteristics, and even horror stories of animals turning human. In the heart of many writers and film writers’ imaginations is the longing for humanness. And what exactly does that mean? You could tell others, couldn’t you? Being human means your body aches much of your life, perhaps from age or injury or athletics, but to be human means to live with pain. To be human means you make choices, choices between right and wrong, and to accept the consequences of poor choices. To be human means that you are finite and mortal, having been given a life span on this earth and in these bodies. This- this flesh and blood, this burden of choices, this life of consequences- is what writers and dreamers have longed to have happen to their puppets or mermaids or robots? Yes; humanness, with all its weaknesses, has unmistakable drawing power. Humans know what it means to touch and be touched: sometimes it is harmful, but many times it’s wonderful. Animals know devotion, but humans experience the richness of love with all of its powers and complexities. People live and die for love; it is the topic of songs and poems and troubadours. Yet as good as human ingenuity is, no one has been able to make a prosthetic arm, leg, eye, or organ that equals the wonder of the God-created ones. To be human is not just a burden because of pain, conflict, and choice; on the contrary to be human is a gift, a blessing, and a fleeting lifetime that is gone too soon. Humanness is more than just the moaning, self-destruction, and defeatism into which some people turn it. Today, let us remember why God, who loves, knows, and sees all, still wanted the experience and insight on the world from becoming human.

Psalm 8 reminds us that we are made higher than creatures and lower than angels and God. So we have a place in the created order! And we are the only ones capable of choices including praise! God needed the human creation to feel complete and glad, to feel appreciated and honored. All creatures great and small God made; but God’s relationship with humans has been the most tortured, yet most desired. Ages ago, and in some cultures even today, fathers chose marriage partners for their children. Most children resented not having a choice. Like a wooden puppet whose creator made him do everything with strings and a carving knife, not having choices was stifling. Choices, in spite of their risks, were worth fighting for in human history. As Ephesians chapter 2 describes it, once the boy (or girl) turned from wooden choicelessness to human choices, desires of the flesh (gluttony, lust, greed, and others) came into play. It was from those deadly sins that God, having experienced their temptations through Jesus Christ, sought to save us through the one who was and is truly human, but also truly God. God did not choose to get trapped in the weaknesses of humanness, but to have a full and sufficient taste for it and then rescue us from its worst parts. Through God in Christ, we can have the greatest living situation on the planet: humanness; but instead of just ending our human life with nothing beyond, we can, through Christ, end up rising from death, not only to life, but to heavenly life. This is why God came to earth in Jesus Christ. God came to save us and to know us. Today, the bread and cup will barely feed your body, but, if you let it, it will feed your soul. Let us give thanks to God today for the intricacies and celebrations of being human.

Jeffrey A. Sumner December 2, 2007