Children playing at make-believe are actually rehearsing a form of social imagining – pretending various archetypal roles as they are perceived by their prepubescent minds, created out of all of the social cues instilled in them by their limited experiences of cultural engagement. In this way, they are learning to reflect the world they see around them. And as they grow older they will begin to pick up on the nuances of shift within culture – ever attempting to figure out where they fit in. This is what we assume to be reality – individuals mirroring the culture, and the culture following the agenda of those we unwittingly accept as social icons.
This, of course, is a very superficial ontology – but it is one of the most contextualizing ways we experience reality. Even the misfit and the social variant find an identity to claim and a socially-expected role to play, regardless of the flux those roles might go through, ever moving them from the fringe towards the ever-reshaping epicenter of what is deemed normal. In this way, the social imaginary of culture is constantly tempting us to believe that reality is what we make of it. So not only does this make for a superficial ontological framing of reality, but it also turns out to be a rather chaotically amorphous framing of reality.
So in the same way that the occupants of Plato’s Cave foolishly might claim that the shadows and shapes flickering on their cave wall were enough to give them an understanding of the world outside – we are inescapably held captive to our own epistemology. When children play make-believe they insert themselves into a narrative that they imagine explains the world . . . and as adults we still pretend, in a more sophisticated way that our narrative explanations of the world are somehow more than just . . . make-believe. So then, how do we actually plunge beneath the surface of reality – beyond the deceptions of our own self-referencing impulse?
In the physical world, the ability of our eyes to see is dependent upon having enough light – when the light is dim, our perception is dim. And when we look out a window at night with an artificial light bouncing off the pane from within, the window becomes a sort of translucent mirror – making of ourselves the centerpiece of what we see in the world outside. But in the natural light of day, the world as it was created pours through the window with that sunlight. And if by chance we catch a glimpse of ourselves in that window, we appear more proportionately placed in context to the world outside. In this way, the source of light changes our perception . . . and this is what it means to look beyond the surface of reality.
My Christian confession is that Jesus is the light of the world (John 8:12) and that by him, and through him, I can see the world as it really is – a world where his narrative is the centerpiece and I have a role to play in the story he is telling. So I “lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” ~ Hebrews 12:1, 2.
Now, some might say I’m just playing a religious game of make-believe . . . but given their source of light, I’m not surprised they’d come to that conclusion.
“Arrows of light pierce my soul . . .”
[…] Open the full article on the kingdomwinds.com site […]