Models, Come to Life

Models of apartment blocks get built and lived in, for better or for worse. The new car model gets assembly-lined then financed and driven by you and me. The models we accept become the new realities of our social and cultural life. So also with our inner life.

Searching for truth, I modeled my life in terms of Darwinian random chance and primal slime, wondering why life was purposeless, wondering why I couldn’t identify truth or value in life. I came so close to ending my story as portrayed by this randomized book of life!

Searching for wisdom, I started to model my life with the building blocks of the “logical” analytic philosophy ideals of my hero mathematician-philosopher but ended up hurling his third volume against the wall when he “confessed” that all he had taught in the previous volumes had ruined his life (and mine)! “I’ve been married 3 times,” he said, “and I still don’t know what love is!” “If I had to do it over again, I wouldn’t touch this way of thought!” I felt betrayed by those “experts” whose models enriched their bank accounts but shaped the despair of my life.

Jesus (who emptied his personal bank account for us) teaches that I should be careful what I hear (education/entertainment?) and be careful how I judge (values/truth?) because it’ll come back upon me, into my very own life. Our models of reality tend to become actualized by and in us. So, as I take a step forward in the story of my life I want to be daily mindful of its overarching theme, choosing what is valuable, what is good, what is beautiful, what is true according to the Jesus model which leads to fulfillment and purpose. I got sick and I got tired of primal slime and purposeless, logical living; Jesus gave me a model worth living – modeled in the image of God, male and female He created us.