Today I was doing some design work at home, and I had Pandora playing in the background. I found myself singing along to a familiar song. I looked, and it was being sung by Jack Johnson, but it is most commonly heard sung by John Lennon. After humming along, it hit me what I was actually singing. It was a sobering thought...
First verse:
"Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today"
Imagine there's no heaven... no heaven! It's easy for some of us to believe there's no hell below us because of our denominational beliefs, but a great many people survive with the thought of a happy ending place in Heaven. It is a place to look forward to, a reason to wake up every morning. How could someone just "live for today" when there's no point even to that? We as Christians are supposed to plan for a future, but live for today. We don't know when Christ is returning to claim us, but we must be ready. That is the reason to live for today, because if Jesus knocks on our door today, will we be ready?
If there is no Heaven, there is no redeeming Christ, and there is no reason to do anything. Many of us hate to admit it, but we have days when we take our eyes off the finish line, and we focus on just today. How do we feel at the end of the day? Have we really accomplished anything? Or have we just wasted the day living for ourselves?
Imagine...
Second verse:
"Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace"
No countries. We are all the same. We all have the same background and the same future. There is nothing to set us apart from everyone else. After all, it is our history, our culture, our ancestry that makes us who we are. That is what creates the beautiful concept of diversity. If there were no countries, no cultures and no diversity, there would be a very stale civilization.
Nothing to kill or die for... There will always be something I would be willing to die for, countries or not. I would die for my family, my friends, my God. But aside from that, with no countries to fight for, we would find other things to die for. It's human nature. And if you take that away, you take away the very heart of a person. We need a purpose. That purpose for many of us is protecting the family that we are a part of. We want to better ourselves and better the world for our children.
And no religion. Well that would lead to chaos. As easy as it might be to imagine a world with no religion, it is impossible. Humans were created with an intense need to worship something. If you take God out of the picture, then we will find something else to worship and create a religion around.
Living in peace with no culture, nothing to die for (and equally nothing to live for) and nothing to worship... that would be such a boring existence. What do we have left to live for? What is there left to identify each of us? Taking away our culture, our God(s), and our right to protect our families is a recipe for disaster.
Verse three:
"Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world"
This is the only verse that makes even just a little bit of sense. No possessions. This is in essence the purest form of being. However it is very idealistic. If there were no possessions, then we would have nothing to give. I believe that God has allowed us to GET so that we may experience the joy of GIVING. Unfortunately so many people focus only on getting and forget to give in return. That is why there are greed and hunger in this world. We have abused the privilege God has allowed us, the ability to own, to get, to earn. Ah, to EARN. That is an interesting concept. Work. Something else that has been abused in many ways. We work and work and work to earn and earn and earn just to spend, spend, spend. However, there are many people who never learned the value of EARNING their living. They depend on handouts because they are too lazy to get themselves a job.
There has got to be a balance between give and take. Just as we can't survive a world that only takes, we would die in a world that only gives. But we cannot forget to give. After all, Christ GAVE the ultimate gift, his life, so that we would have the opportunity to give.
Chorus:
"You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one"
Yes, John Lennon was a dreamer. I believe he wanted a better world, but his definition is impossible and unhealthy. I can't join in his way of thinking though. Because I can see a greater picture of this world and why it is the way it is. This world in built on the idiosyncrasies of the human nature. But we were created with primal needs and instincts. Take those away, and what do you have left? Robots on auto pilot, just going through the motions of happiness? Living with nothing to live for? Seems to me to be similar to the live of a mouse in a cage. He lives to eat, poop, and run in circles on a wheel that takes him nowhere. That's not a life. Not for me.
Imagine though... living your life for Christ, in his example, in his footprints, with his purpose? There are endless possibilities for how that life would turn out. Living for Christ brings out the very best in each of us. Christ polishes the grime off of our human nature and allows Christ's nature to shine through like a prism, bouncing his light off of everything it touches.
What a beautiful image. Just imagine...
