Recently I read again a folk story about a couple whose home was set amidst unbelievably beautiful surroundings. Four sparkling streams irrigated the land and danced across the rocks and flowed over the sand. Orchards and vineyards spangled the terraces. A menagerie roamed virgin forests and meadows. Birds fluttered from tree to tree.
The water was not polluted by the slime from dirty factories and the refuse of urban sprawl. The air was not polluted with carbon monoxide exhaled from thousands of automobile exhausts. The ground was not cluttered with beer cans, pop bottles, Styrofoam containers, and thousands of other items of trash and junk.
Theirs was a garden paradise. But the story does not end with, “They lived happily ever after.”
The story goes on to say their home was a mess. The woman was tempted by a snake. This snake would have made a great advertiser: Look around. See what you don’t have. You must have more. Folks down the street have it. You need more. You must have it all. Why don’t you get it? They’re giving a rebate. Buy it; use it awhile; throw it away; get some more. You can have it all.
But they couldn’t have it all. One does not need a Ph.D. in philosophy or theology to know that absolute freedom is not the apex of life. Life at its richest has boundaries. An ancient oriental garden had two major characteristics: a boundary wall, and order and symmetry. Before Eve met the serpent, Eden had its boundary: the fruit of one tree was forbidden.
Whatever else this story means, it is saying God never intended for human beings to have everything or do everything they might want. This not only applies to individuals, but also to governments.
Above all, governments must realize they have limits. No nation can have it all. National leaders have never seemed to learn this. Alexander and the Greeks couldn’t have it all. Napoleon and France couldn’t have it all. Hitler and Nazi Germany couldn’t have it all. Stalin and the Soviets couldn’t have it all.
Some governmental officials still haven’t gotten it.
Zionists and Palestinians haven’t learned they can’t have all of Palestine. Osama bin Laden hasn’t learned he can’t even wreak all the destruction and misery he wants. President Bush and a whole swarm of senators and representatives surely haven’t learned it. Even the super powerful United States can’t have it all.
It concerns me that the president seems to think our country can have all the world’s police force, make all the decisions, have all the political power, and all the weapons of mass destruction. Somehow he needs to come to grips with the reality that we can’t have all the wealth, power, and influence he would like us to have.
All those former Soviet Union atomic scientists roaming around waiting to be hired, and all those atomic warheads packed in moth balls waiting to be bought up by some demigod who doesn’t like anybody who disagrees with it very much, remind us that Earth is not the safest township in the universe. A gang leader in North Korea fires off his own atomic Saturday night special. Another gang leader in Iran seems to be smuggling high tech switchblade knives and brass knuckles into the hip pockets of uncontrollable fellow hoodlums in the neighborhood next door. And the biggest gang leader of all, who has more nuclear hand guns, switchblades, and brass knuckles than all the rest of the world put together, won’t even sit down and talk with these guys.
It has seemed to me that President Bush has not realized we could all be cremated equal. Somehow, I have not gotten the impression he realizes that the U.S.A. all by itself has enough atomic clout to turn this planet into a charred out chunk of charcoal tumbling through space, somewhere farther east of Eden than God ever intended the descendants of Adam and Eve to wander. And yet our government has recently accepted a design for a new generation of atomic warheads by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California.
With our pursuit for new atomic warheads, what kind of persuasive power do we posses in the present discussions with Iran, Korea, or anybody else about their aspirations for nuclear weapons? What kind of authority do we take to table with Iran, Syria, and others over the terrible situation in Iraq? I can only pray there will be sensible proposals made and heard by all parties involved.
R. David Fillpot was a U.S. Army paratrooper from 1953-56 and Presbyterian pastor, now honorably retired and living in Asheville, N.C. He has been a pastor of churches in Ill., Iowa, Ohio, Minn., and Pa.
