In His perfect composition of the symphony God created everything to be GOOD…
I often teach students texts written by the Catholic fantasy author, J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien wrote at the beginning of the 20th century, and his work was often allegorical reflections of Catholicism. Tolkien is most famous for his classic fantasy novels, which include “The Hobbit” and the “Lord of the Rings” Trilogy, which were recently repopularised through the films by the same names.
In some of his other writing, Tolkien once referred to God as a great Composer of a great and perfect symphony.
I read this statement by Tolkien again recently, and I have been reflecting on it ever since because the analogy is very clever and very simple to understand…
Tolkien explains in his analogy that at the beginning of time God composed a beautifully perfect symphony through creation. He understood what instruments we could play, and He knew what talents we would have, and He understood all that it was possible for our souls to do. And bearing this knowledge in mind, God used this PERFECT knowledge and PERFECT understanding to make the most PERFECT possible use of such talents and instruments in the composition of His beautiful symphony.
And we see this composition in the Book of Genesis in the Bible, where we see the story of creation and we are told that for each thing that god created, God saw that it was GOOD. Because in His perfect composition of the symphony God created everything to be GOOD… These are the words that we hear in the Book of Genesis when we hear the story of creation. Each thing that God created was GOOD because each thing reflected God’s goodness in the PERFECT symphony that He created.
But – and it is a big but – when God composed the symphony, He also gave us FREE WILL. And free will is where things got messy. You see, the Evil One – who was among the first to disregard the perfect composition of God and attempt to play according to his own tune through the corrupted exercise of his free will – started to create discord in the symphony. Discord is the sound that one hears when the music does not quite work together – when things sound sharp or flat or not quite in time or not quite right and the sound is unpleasant to the ears…
And this discord created by the Evil One, began to clash with all the beautiful sounds in the music that God had created, and with the Fall of Humankind – through Adam and Eve’s Original Sin of pride and disobedience – the sounds of that discord grew so violent and terrible that the sound was truly frightening...
And that is the sound that we hear when we suffer because suffering is the consequence of the Fall of Humankind…
But God – our God – can turn EVERYTHING to the GOOD… And so, the violent discord what was caused by evil – where there is an absence of the Good and therefore an absence of God – was no match for the infinite GLORY of God… For God is Almighty and God is Perfect… And as the Infinite Almighty Composer, God knows what the Evil One and all his followers are going to play. And so, God arranged a NEW score and He used it to wrap all the discord and all violent disarray into an even more beautiful composition than His original symphony.
And this is His gift to us through sacrifice. For while suffering is the sound of discord caused by a universal rejection of the Will of God, the Composer uses even this suffering to make His piece PERFECTLY beautiful again… For He gives us the opportunity to turn suffering into sacrifice… And that is a gift that I have not the words to thank God for…
Because without our ability to sacrifice, we would have no way to allow God to work through us for the GOOD…
How awesome in my Lord and God, the PERFECT Composer of the PERFECT Symphony, who brings harmony out of disharmony and sacrifice out of suffering…
How awesome is my Lord and God…
For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.