Counting
Finger Lakes Environmental Film FestivalMarch 27 - April 2, 2006
Ithaca College
Art installation: Counting (Mary Zebell, Artist)
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Iraq War: 58,000
Vietnam War: more than 3,100,000
Tsunami disaster: more than 280,000
Hurricane Katrina: more than 1,400
For a number of weekends this month, I had the honor of helping an artist with an art installation titled Counting that will be set up on IC campus.
We had to painstakingly pull wooden slats out of the snow fence, paint them black and write names on them; names of victims of wars or natural disasters.
I don't know why I started thinking too deeply into it. Maybe it's just the thing I do, or it may be a result of talking to the artist. But I started to feel something...
What do these numbers mean?
You get consumed by these huge numbers, the magnitude.
You see the big picture but I challenge you to spare a thought for the small picture.
As I am painting these wooden slats individually, it hit me.
Behind these large numbers are persons. These persons are individuals. Each of these individual is a person.
A person with a name.
A person with a family.
A person with friends.
A person with a country.
The person is the reason for the numbers we see. Go beyond the numbers and remember the person it represents.
Sometimes we are overwhelmed by the impact that we forgot what it really means.
Take a moment to remember the precious lives. No, each time just remember one precious life.
Think about what the life could've become.
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As I see the snow fence I saw another image. The wooden slats are bounded together what looks like barbed wires. The wire is wound around the individual wooden slats.
It brought to my mind the image of Christ on the cross, with the crown of thorns upon His head. The crown of thorns on Jesus' head is wound around His thoughts, and He was thinking about you and I.
How true it is, that when Jesus hung on the cross with the crown on thorns, his thought is wound around His people.
He is thinking of each and every one of us on the cross.
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My challenge to you is to find Jesus in every thing you do. It can be mundane, it can be secular. But God doesn't wait for you to do something spiritual to show you how much He loves you.
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Sanelogy in prose
PS: By the way, did anyone of you watch the 78th Academy Awards? Is it me, or is there an alarming number of stars getting cosmetic surgery? I don't know but Nicole Kidman just looked different! And Dolly Parton looks plastic! Those eyes! Those cheeks! Those lips! I was astounded!
And congratulations to Crash, for winning Best Picture. Truly deserving.
Sane reflects @ this location permanently
1 reflects:
sober entry today.. but food for thought really.. people these days are too self-centred.. its all about me me and more me... where and what happened to the rest of the people around you ?
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