Imagine that

“God is able to accomplish abundantly far more than we can ask or imagine” (Eph. 3:14-21)

Use your imagination!
You have no imagination!
I can’t even imagine how you feel!
What an imaginative flower arrangement that is!
Imagine how frightened I was!

Have you ever stopped to think about what you mean when you use the word “imagination”? What do we mean when we say someone has no imagination, or to a friend: “I can’t even begin to imagine how you feel.” So what, then, does Ephesians 3:14-21 mean when it says that God can do far more than we can imagine?

Let us imagine that it is 1986 and Bernhard and Jane have just arrived at Volmoed. As they look around they see many things that they recognize – various types of tree and flower, the hills and the river. They recognize them because their brains have a store of images that have built up over the years since childhood which enable them to recognize such things. We call it our memory. They can make sense of the flowers and trees on Volmoed, even though some are new to them, because they correspond to those images already stored up in their brains. But now the brain includes new information in its memory bank, new Volmoed images, so that in future Bernhard and Jane can recognize the sights and smells that are peculiar to Volmoed. Without this vast and growing number of memories stored in their brain they could not relate to the world day by day. In fact, no one can live fully and meaningfully in the present unless their past is also kept alive in their brain cells. That’s why Alzheimer’s is such a debilitating illness.

Jane and Bernhard also have stored memories associated with houses and hotels, conference and retreat centres, game parks and Kirstenbosch Gardens, that they have visited, and these images are waiting to come into action as they begin to think about the future of Volmoed. We will build a house over there like the one we saw in Plett, we will plant gardens under those trees just like at Eagles Nest, we will dam the river and make a pond where ducks can come and make their home. We will build a meeting room and a kitchen, and accommodation for sixty people. Imagine if one day we will build a chapel, they say, and immediately images of churches and chapels come to mind to provide the stimulus for thinking about this. The images stored in the brain are coming to life in their imagination, another basic function of the brain. Memory and imagination are working in tandem. In fact, without memory we could not function, we have to take the past with us and fortunately the past is still with us in our brains. But without imagination we would not be able to access those memories and put them to work as we anticipate and plan for the future; not just the distant future, but also the future around the corner. If I had no imagination I might still recognize the snake lying on the path because the snake image is in my memory bank, but I would not anticipate the danger ahead of me. Imagination is our ability to organize the images we have collected over the years into new patterns so that we can use them now and if need be make decisions and changes.

When I was in high school I played hockey for the first team, in fact, if I may say, I was captain! I played centre-forward which meant that everyone else in the team did all the hard work and I scored the goals. But scoring goals meant being able to anticipate the moves being made on the field, and therefore being in the right place at the right time. Anticipation, which is critical in sport, is imagination at work. But, of course, imagination is also the key to creative art, whether painting or sculpture, drama or poetry. Artists are creative because they keep on exploring fresh possibilities for the images they have stored up in their brains, expressing them in new ways. We not only live in the past through our memory, but we also live in the future through our imagination. So much for the abbot’s notion that only the present exists! If that is the case the present would not exist because it only exists in our minds where memory and imagination intersect. “Imagination” someone has said, “frees us from the tyranny of the present, of the logical, of the ‘real.’ It also frees us from the constraints of the now; as it pictures what events were like in the historic past or what they might become in the future.”

Imagination does not always get a good press in the Bible. The reason is obvious – we can also use our imagination to plot evil actions. Murderers like computer hackers can be very imaginative! Idolatry is a work of the imagination because we turn certain images into gods. So the Bible speaks about the vain imaginations of the heart (cf. Acts 4:25), or imagining that godliness is a way to make money (I Tim. 6:5). Yes, imagination can lead to evil actions, but on the other hand, without imagination we would not be able to see the world through the eyes of those who are suffering and therefore find ways to help them. Without imagination we would not be able to make plans for the future development of Volmoed or anticipate the outcome of the plans we make today.

Let us think of our imagination as a gift of God to be used creatively and redemptively. Let us consider how to use and develop our imagination in our prayers and worship, in reading the Bible, in our relationships and our daily work. Let us help others develop their capacity to imagine creatively and redemptively as part of our healing ministry, so that all of us can become more caring and compassionate, more productive people. Let us understand imagination not just as a function of the brain, but as a gift of God to enrich life and the struggle for a better world? Imagine that, a better world!

But let us also recognize that there are limits to our imagination, which brings us back to our text. “God” so we are told, “is able to accomplish abundantly far more than we can ask or imagine.” The truth is, we simply don’t have enough images stored in our brains to comprehend the ultimate mystery of life we call God, or to grasp the full extent of God’s love and grace, or to understand what Einstein called “the mind of God.” One day maybe…but for the moment we can only begin to imagine “the breadth, length, height and depth… of the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.”

(John W. de Gruchy is Emeritus Professor of Christian Studies, University of Cape Town and Extraordinary Professor at the University of Stellenbosch. This is a weekly meditation given at the Eucharist service at Volmoed Christian Community Centre, Hermanus.)