I was saddened to hear of the death of Michael Jackson. I'm a child of the 80's, and I just can't help love his music. What an incredibly talented person, what a horribly sad, tragic, lonely life! Yes, he made some unfortunate choices, but I will not cast a stone. I also have made some pretty pathetic decisions in my life as well. As have we all.
I downloaded Michael's Earth Song video yesterday. I love that video. The song isn't as effective without the visual. Very expressive, and very very powerful. It expresses visually and musically exactly the way I feel whenever I witness the heartless cruelty and wanton desecration human are capable of towards GOD's incredible creation, and each other! I want to wail and scream and tear at the earth too at our stubborn selfishness and greed. It truly breaks my heart and rends my soul.
Yesterday afternoon, Hannah, my almost-5-daughter (who never misses the chance to remind me that her birthday is coming soon!) sat down to watch the video with me. She's a very perceptive little girl, and very sensitive. I was interested to see what her reaction to the footage would be.
She sat there on my lap, and soon got a very serious look on her face. I started to talk, and she said "Shhhh mommy... I'm watching!" In a moment, towards the end, I asked her what she was thinking. She said "I think this makes God very very sad." WOW. Out of the mouth of a babe! She was so touched at the Amazon Natives clutching at the earth in despair. She did not like the dead elephant at all. "The baby too?" Yes, I said, the baby too. "Why???????" Oh my.
She brightened a little bit at the part where the "wind" reverses everything.... the rainforest trees are upright again, the elephant is resurrected- with tusks again- and the tanks are blown out of the city, and the man who was shot comes back to life again. God was blowing all the bad away. I said "only in the movie, honey. It's not real." She was puzzled. I continued. "It would be so wonderful if God really would just blow all the bad away. But he won't. He CAN, but he won't. " She was still puzzled. But I knew this was important, and she really wanted to know.
"Honey... when you do something wrong,like breaking something, and you KNOW it's wrong, do I come and fix it all for you?" "No, mommy. You make me clean it up." "That's right. I COULD clean it up, but I don't. Because that's YOUR job. You knew better, so I leave YOU to do it." There was a flicker of comprehension in her eyes.
"God is like that. The very first job GOD gave us was to take care of His creation. All the plants, all the animals. To care for it, to keep it safe. We all KNOW that, deep down inside. But most people don't do it. They hurt His creation, the hurt the forests, the animals in it, and they hurt other people. We KNOW we aren't supposed to do that, but we do it anyway. So, I believe God is expecting US to do our job. To clean up our mess. He could do it, but we are supposed to do it."
"Mommy?"
"Yes sweetie?"
"Can I see it again?"
"Sure."
This time we didn't speak at all. She was silent for the whole thing. Then she said, at the end, "God made that tree. We shouldn't chop it down! And that's GOD'S elephant! God must be sooooo sad."
She gets it. She definitely gets it. How full my heart is!
