Angels and Holes

There is a little girl, and she is the most beautiful little girl you have ever seen, mainly because she is more like an angel or cherubim than like a little girl. She is exactly the little girl that frolics in a field of perfect flowers in your imagination, the precise way we tend to think the little ones in heaven must look, the way we know everything will look so perfect in that perfect place. 

Her hair is blond, so blond it is almost white, with long, roving sausage curls which fall down her shoulders and arms. Small white flowers are woven through the perfect curls. Her skin shimmers and her cheeks have a perfect pinkish color to them.

Her eyes are incredible, a sea of green and blue waters which never end. She is a child full of childlikeness, but also full of the super-natural wisdom of eternity.

She is sitting on a fluffy white cloud, you see, and the light of God is shining around her and through her. Her slender hands with her perfect tiny finger nails are folded on her lap, and she sits with one leg crossed beneath her, and the other dangling freely off the edge of the fluffy cloud.

She looks down from her soft cloud, and she sighs, a sigh so sweet it smells like peppermint candy.

Below her, she sees us.

She looks down and she sees us, running about.

She looks down and she sees us frantic and scattered around a bunch of enormous, endless black holes.

The holes really are endless, that is no exaggeration on her part nor on mine. They are endless holes.

The holes are everywhere, and in observing from above, she can’t help but wonder at how futile our efforts are when it comes to filling and patching the holes.

She sees some of us, who seem to pretend the holes aren’t even there. We evade them with all the calculated cleverness of a serpent. We stay busy, bustling, moving, and keep our distance from the edge. We are typically the ones who deny the reality of the holes until we fall into one and it hurts.

She sees others who obsess about the holes. All they can think about are the holes. They are chasing after  anyone who can tell them anything about the holes, anyone who will obsess about the holes along with them.  They see how obvious and ugly the holes are, and this fact seems to consume their life. They never get past the holes, they just stare at them and continue to be appalled.

She sees many who seem to have reached a point of total reckless abandon, and they are throwing things into the holes, trying to fill them in vain. They throw strange things into the holes, things which clearly won’t ever fill the holes, but for some reason the people keep trying it over and over again. But the holes just get bigger and uglier for all their efforts.

After some time, she spots an obscure land without holes. When she looks closer she sees that the holes are still there, but somehow the people in this land have found a way to appease the holes. The holes are full of something – what is it? It looks like a soft fog, like clouds with a light breeze. It is the only thing which can fill the holes, why don’t all the other people find out what it is so they can fill their holes?

Upon further quiet observance she realizes, with a gasp, that the holes are all shaped like her Father! These people are looking for her Father but they don’t even seem to know what they are looking for!

 Now some of the people from the land without holes are talking to the people who still live with the holes. The hole-people are laughing at them. They turn back and keep ignoring the holes, or obsessing about the holes, or trying to fill the holes in ways that only make the holes worse.

But every once in awhile, one of the hole-people listens to the people from the land without holes. They follow them. They are exhausted. They take rest in the land of no holes and they are grateful.

The little angel girl smiles, and her teeth are so white it hurts your eyes, it’s so beautiful. She recognizes that the people in the land without holes must know her Father, and this brings her great joy. He is the great filler of holes, He is the one who stops the torture of the endless black holes. She is so pleased to see more of the hole-people coming to know her Father that she flutters off of her cloud, and flies off through the cloud-mist to sit in His lap and tell Him she loves Him and that He is wonderful…..

In his book The Pursuit of God, A.W. Tozer writes, “Every age has its own characteristics. Right now we are in an age of religious complexity. The simplicity which is in Christ is rarely found among us. It its stead are programs, methods, organizations, and a world of nervous activities which will occupy our time and attention but can never satisfy the longing of our heart.”

Tozer goes on to say that “When religion has had its last word, there is little that we need other than God Himself. The evil habit of seeking God-and effectively prevents us from finding God in full revelation. In the and lies our great woe. If we omit the and we shall soon find God, and in Him we shall find that for which we have all our lives been secretly longing.”

Do you know that you have a God-sized hole?

What is it that you try to pour into your God-sized hole to fill it?

Do you know that only God can fill the God-sized hole?

Do you know that the hole will continue to suck the life and joy and peace and rest out of you until God and God alone fills it for you?

Do you seek God, or do you seek God- and? What are your “ands” ?

Jesus and…successful ministry, all As in school, friends with transformed hearts who love Christ but give me all the credit, a husband who is always happy and at my service, kids who aren’t naught or stinky. Jesus and freedom from all the defects in my character, Jesus and no struggle whatsoever.

What do you mean I’m greedy?  Jesus is not like Santa Claus?

Strip me of everything, leave me with Jesus? 

We are busy, and we are complex. I often find myself running around like I am really someone important, like maybe all my running will fill my God-hole, or maybe I myself will even fill someone else’s God-hole. Today I remember that no amount of my frantic activity can take Jesus’ place in my God hole.