More Thoughts on Words (Or Just One, Really)

So after many months I've still been trying to wrap my mind around Christ as The Word, the singular and best expression of God to mankind. And as I send these puny thoughts out into cyberspace, I ponder the thousands of other blogs like mine, made by people just as average as me, just as desperate to communicate, just as hopeful to be known on a deeper, soul-bearing level. Man's desire to be known is a strong one, and I will say it again (shall I say it again?): God gave us words with which to try, and that is not a gift to be squandered.

So we send out our squiggles and lines, which are barely representations of the soul reality we are straining to see (and with the eyesight of a mole to boot). We put into forms that which has no form; we choose denotations and connotations but are never quite satisfied with how we say something because we know some random soul will misinterpret the whole thing, and the unity we desire will be squashed into frustration instead. (Indeed, the good gift of words can become a poison if we do not guard it.)

Good or bad, language links us, and it behooves us to think both horizontally and vertically. Some bloggers know their audience and write expressly for them; others, however, write for no real audience but themselves and the occasional, accidental reader. I like to think, though, that we of the latter category write also for God the Spirit--not God as an audience, however; no, He is more, perhaps, the muse, or the prompter who provides the lines we attempt to deliver on this makeshift stage. And, oh!, how I need Him, for I do make a rather poor thespian, constantly forgetting and asking for those lines, but made a better player by them in the end.

He's merciful that way.

But beyond this idea of audience, why do we write? God has endowed us all with a need to communicate. From the babble of infants to the poetry of the most erudite masters, language shapes our learning, and learning shapes our language. To what end (and from what beginning) does this spiral advance? The irony of it all is that, from before time, over the course of history and into the future, all the words that have ever been or ever will be spoken all point to--from man's perspective--one need: the need for a God who understands him even without those billions of words in billions of languages, spoken desperately whether he's known it or not. From God's perspective, however, they point to Himself, for the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. God did, after all, create this idea of words--something paradoxical enough that it actually works. He is our Author: the one Word. All we've ever needed, and all we'll ever need.

A Revision

Just a note to say I revised a small part of the poem "Words" (below). I switched

To think and keep thinking,
To write and keep writing,

with

To make these futile attempts,
To delight in them,

I think the consonance is much better now. ...not that anyone but me would care! But writing is a process, and capturing that process at least occasionally is important. I think remembering it helps writers remember to keep their patience (and their sanity) when in the trenches.
And I feel as though I am in the pre-trenches at the moment; I'm hoping these post-holiday thoughts will settle down on paper soon...