I was about nine years old when I first learned about indelible ink. I don’t remember the exact context, but I know it had something to do with the many carvings my dad created and hung all over our home. In his beautiful calligraphy, he had inscribed each with poetry, verse, or scripture.
“Ye are of more value than many sparrows,” (Matthew 10:31; Luke 12:7) was one of the messages that streamed from those carvings right into my psyche during my critical formative years. And in our dining room hung the verse that was to become a life-verse for my siblings and me: "I have been young, and now am old, and yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread." (Psalm 37:25)
I do not believe there is any “magic” in words. I do not subscribe to modern philosophies that endow words with a kind of mystical power containing an inherent authority to control life and direct its course in an absolute sense. I believe that only God has that kind of sovereignty and control. But I do believe that words can create indelible messages that touch our spirits with encouragement or discouragement, calm or strife, hope or despair.
And I do know that the symbols carved on our walls were simultaneously etched in the realm of faith, and belief, and possibility, and became evident in realities such as amazing and abundant blessings of food in my family even in times of "drought" and hardship.
The God Who gave us language and the ability to communicate, knows that words are powerful. We are told that “the tongue has the power of life and death” (Proverbs 18:21). God urged the people of Israel to choose life instead of death; blessings instead of curses. (Deuteronomy 30:19) They were to write the words of life and of blessing on their doorframes, and to teach them to their children. Because words matter. Symbols matter. Messages matter. Messages from songs, movies, media, culture – all have the power of life and death; and the power to choose is still ours.
Yet, that connection is seldom made. Countless people wander blindly through the maze of deadly messages masquerading as “truth”. And for the younger generations, the sound and the fury press down and run over. Thoreau, should he live in our world, might conclude that “quiet desperation” has risen to a crescendo of hopelessness, especially among the young; and even as “the games and amusements of mankind” have increased in pace and frenzy “there is [still] no play in them” (Thoreau, H. D. (2016). Walden. Macmillan Collector’s Library).
The need for intentional investment in symbols of hope and meaning and purpose couldn’t be greater. In the din, and cacophony and confusion around us, the only way to discern against the inauthentic—the shimmer—the mirage—is to cultivate the authentic: Pray. Teach. Affirm.
Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. (Deuteronomy 6:7-9)
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