What others See in Your Home
Let’s pretend aliens really do exist. On the aliens’ planet, there exists a King Alien. The King Alien knows that there is a God who created the planet Earth. Every night, the King Alien looks out in the distant sky at night and studies this planet “Earth” through his telescope. Earth’s Creator must have big plans for the people who get to live there.
The King really wants to know more about who lives on this “Earth”, so he asks his wisest alien to read all of the books in the alien library and discover who inhabits this beautiful planet made by an imaginative creator.
The wise subject returns to the King and reports, “Humans live on Earth. They have been made by God, in His image. He has big plans for them and one of His biggest commandments is to love each other.”
Those lucky humans. I want to know how to love as they do. So, the King Alien commands his smartest aliens to construct a rocket that can travel to Earth. The king grows impatient as he waits for his smartest aliens to finish the rocket. I bet humans could do it faster. They were made by God and must know the key to a full life. Finally, the rocket is done. It can travel to Earth and back.
King Alien calls two of his most trusted alien subjects to his throne. “I want you to spend some time on Earth and report back to me. Your mission is to learn what humans value most.” The King was well aware that the aliens and the humans would not be able to communicate, as the aliens could not let themselves be seen.
It was time for the rocket to depart the aliens’ planet and travel to earth to learn more about these humans. The ride was smooth and easy. The aliens landed on earth and spent seven days there. They took great notes and returned to the aliens’ planet safe and sound.
The king immediately called the two explorers to his throne. He knew the alien explorers were tired after not sleeping for seven days and being away from their alien families, so he asked them to pick ONE thing that is most important to the humans.
“After watching the humans intently for seven whole days, do tell me…What do they hold most dear? What is most important to these humans? Please tell me just this, then you can return to your families.”
Here is what the aliens reported: “King Alien, the humans hold rectangles most dear. They have a fascination with this shape. They don’t go anywhere without their rectangle. Humans look at it while their children play t-ball. They are distracted by their rectangle when their daughter wants them to watch her dance instead. When their child tells them a story, they are gazing intently at this rectangle, responding half-heartedly to their child. When they pick up their child from school, it is this rectangle they talk to instead of the child they have been absent from all day. They sit on the couch with their larger rectangle and do not talk with their spouse because they might miss something on their rectangle. When they are not looking at their rectangle, they are distractedly thinking about it. When teenagers are eating with their parents, they are tapping their rectangle repeatedly. When they go on walks, they are gazing down at the rectangle. In the car, everyone is looking at their rectangle. Most humans hold their rectangles in their pockets. Often, there will be multiple humans in a room, all of them interacting with their own rectangle or one big rectangle in the room. After being apart from each other all day, families spend time on the couch gazing at their one large rectangle in the center of the room. The bright rectangles sure do distract them from loving. And, what we can’t seem to understand is that the most valuable rectangle of all contains the words of their Creator, the one who made them and died for them. This rectangle is the Truth, left for them to know how to live and how to love. But, this rectangle authored by God himself is rarely touched. It seems the lit up rectangles are more important. It seems these rectangles with images and buttons distract them from loving.”
The aliens continued, “We tried to steal this rectangle authored by God, and we succeeded, King. We do have the rectangle in our possession. It is called, ‘Bible’.”
“And what of the other rectangles? The ones that the humans spend all of their time looking at? The ones that distract them from loving. Did you steal one of those too?”, the King asked.
“We are sorry, sir. But the bible was easy to steal because it was never in their possession and once it was gone, they didn’t even notice. But, the valuable rectangles…Well, sir, it seems that they were never out of their reach. They held it close to them constantly and if we did succeed in stealing it, we feared they would soon hunt us down as they cannot go long without their rectangles.”
The king dismissed his subjects and searched through this Bible. After reading the bible, cover to cover, he was most confused. The humans have this book at their fingertips. This book which consists of the most amazing love story ever told. In this book is the story of their Savior who has pursued them from the beginning. This Savior left heaven to walk with His people on earth and die for them. Then, he rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. God mercifully left this great book for the humans to be their “daily bread”. This book is “living and active”. Yet, it sits on their shelves untouched. Instead, they opt for their other rectangles that light up and send messages and share tweets and Facebook posts. Obviously, humans care more about what others have to say than their one true God.
These humans are not as wise as I thought…
Brooke Williams writes, serves, and makes disciples in Florida with her husband, Brian, and her church, Heritage Community Church, as she spiritually invests in their two children, Ainsley & Braxton.
