Inadequate language

Have you ever tried to describe the grandeur of a harvest moon or the beauty of a sunrise? The smell of cinnamon or the various hues of blue? Can you find the words to describe love? Language is a woefully inadequate tool for expressing even those things bound by our five senses and three dimensions. Add to that our emotions and intuitions and our internal sense of something, and language quickly fails us.

How much more difficult it must have been for Jesus to describe those things beyond our experience – Heaven, the Kingdom of God, Eternity. Only He had direct experience of those realms, but what words could He possibly have used to describe them?

Fortunately, God, in His wisdom, gave us tastes, examples, in His created world that hinted at this other world; perishable things that reflected the imperishable. We find many of these hints in our gardens; and the prophets and Jesus called them to our attention.

A man planted a vineyard… Mark 12:1

The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early to hire laborers for his vineyard. Matthew 20:1

The garden even provides hints at some difficult concepts.

The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed… It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown, it is the greatest of shrubs. Matthew 13:31-32

Very truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains a single grain, but if it dies, it bears much fruit. John12:24

Even with these concrete examples, I can barely visualize this heaven, this kingdom.

The prophets and seers of visions throughout time faced this problem – how to describe a world beyond our five senses, beyond our three dimensions?

Isaiah envisions this Kingdom of God and expresses it like this:

On the day: A pleasant vineyard, sing about it! I, the Lord, am its keeper, every moment I water it. I guard it night and day so that no one can harm it. Isaiah 27:2-3

John envisions heaven and expresses it like this:

On either side of the river of Life is the tree of Life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. John 22:2

Inadequate language. Vineyards and trees and seeds just a hint, just a glimpse of things beyond our comprehension.

Perhaps all of nature, and not just the garden, is a parable of sorts – a parable that can reveal the nature of God to us if we only open our eyes and ears and hearts. If only we allow the Holy Spirit, God within us, to open them for us.

Then the disciples came and asked Him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” Jesus answered, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given… blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears, for they hear. Matthew 13:10,16

How can I describe a sunrise? What words can I use to tell of my heart expanding in love? Language is inadequate to describe what I know in the wordless center of my soul. But I know them to be what they are; I know they are real. The Holy Spirit knows the kingdom of God, knows heaven, knows eternity. If the Holy Spirit abides in you, then somewhere in the wordless center of your soul, you are being shown what these things are; you are being shown that they are real.

I have many things to say to you, but you cannot hear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. John 16:12-13

Thank you for reading along as I continue my struggles with language. Your support means more than I could ever express.

Betsy