People Shaped Void

This blog and the next one are the translations from my friends’ blog, originally written in Japanese. Hachiko to Boboru no Nikki (Hachiko & Boboru’s diary). Blue part is all Hachiko's writing in my translation.

The theme of the CC06 is vertical (connection with God) and horizontal (connection with brothers and sisters in Christ) relationships. Hachiko & Boboru are in the preparation committee for the CC06, and most of the committee members read their blog. It seems like God is directing us to contemplate on the horizontal relationships through their blog in preparation of CC06. We are reading Philippians in our C20s small group, so the topic is also relevant for me in that light.

We often hear about a God shaped void in the heart of a human that could only be filled by God. I really think it’s true. But I heard during the sermon today that there is another void in human’s heart, besides the one with the shape of God. This void is human shaped, and God refrains from filling it himself.

When God created this world, God saw each of his creations and deemed them “good”. But in this process of creation, there was a time he said “not good”. That was when the human was alone to himself.

In the trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy sprit, God always exists in relationships. And we, who are created in the image of God, are also designed to exist in relationships. Until our God shaped void is filled by the relationship with God, and people shaped void is filled by human relationships, we will always be deficient and never feel whole.

I heard about a statistical data; it shows the life expectancy of people who have significant relationships with others to be several years longer in comparison to that of people who do not. Moreover, when you take the life expectancy of people who exercise regularly, have enough sleep and good diet, but do not have relationships that are important to them, and compare it with the life expectancy of people who don’t pay close attention to their health but have significant relationships, people with significant relationships tend to live several years longer. “Maybe it means I can live longer by eating junk food with my loved ones, than chewing on broccolis all by myself,” said the pastor, smiling. (It reminded me of a similar verse in Proverbs. Like, it is better to eat vegetable and love each other than eat meat and hate each other. Well, it’s a little different, I guess.)

I also heard about a story of Chuck Swindoll. One day Rev. Swindoll was talking to a new Christian, and the guy said, “Church life is wonderful, but I sometimes wish the church was a little more like a bar”. He went on to say when he used to go to bars, he felt completely safe to be open and share his inner most joy and sorrow there, but he can't do the same in church. The pastor said, “For 60 years, my father kept choosing bars over the church for the very reason.”

Only if the church was a little more like a bar… It's a rather unfamiliar concept, but I understand what he's getting at. There are human shaped voids in our hearts, which God does not fill with himself, but specifically designed so that other humans will fill them… May the church, the body of Christ be the place, not only where we meet God to fill our God shaped void, but also be the place where we truly meet others who will fill our people shaped voids…