Day 14 ( senses)

the house among the roses
one of Monet's last paintings

This week 90 years ago Claude Monet, the artist, died.  I happen to know this because quite by chance I turned on the radio this afternoon to a radio play about Monet's last few years.  I knew very little about him apart from the fact that he painted water lillies, so I was astounded to discover that for the last few years of his life Monet was almost completely blind.   But what is staggering is the fact that he was still painting.  Despite having less than ten percent vision in only one eye and not being able to see colours properly , let alone shapes or people.

It made me think of Beethoven composing some of his most amazing work when he was totally deaf.  So deaf that when he finished conducting his works someone had to physically turn him around so that he could see the audience applauding - he was unable to hear or even sense them.

Aren't human beings amazing?  

But there is something more to this than just the dogged determination of the human spirit to keep on creating even when the odds are severely stacked against.  I'm not exactly sure what it is, but I think it has something to do with the other dimension in which we are living - the spiritual realm where we can see things that are not visible to the human eye and hear things that are not audible in the natural world.   The 21st century tends to label people as mentally ill if they ' hear' and ' see' things which are ' not there'.   But the 21st century has missed a trick.  Because the invisible world is more real, vital, powerful and present than this pale shadow in which we live.  Every now and again this other dimension breaks through into time and space and angel choirs appear in the sky.  Gabriel appears to Mary.  Moses and Elijah come down on a mountain top.  Loaves and fish suddenly multiply.  Water becomes solid enough to walk on.  Dead people are resurrected and ascend into heaven.   THAT is the reality.  All this stuff we can touch and see and hear and taste and smell is just a dress rehearsal for the real thing.

God is super creative and wonderful and alive.  I just know that there is music in heaven which is more glorious than anything we could ever start to imagine.  There are colours we have yet to experience and for which we have no names.  The artistry of God in nature takes our breath away - so just imagine what heaven is like!     The supernatural is constantly at the threshold , so close that it can be seen and heard and touched and tasted.  All we need to do is still our bodily senses and ask that our spiritual senses be opened up.  Then, like Elisha's servant, we might look up one day and see chariots of fire, or like Mary, Elizabeth and Joseph see angels.