There's Treasure Everywhere

Excerpts from Tim Challies @ www.challies.com

I've always loved Calvin & Hobbes. My friend Brian first introduced me to the comic strip back when I was a young teen and I immediately fell in love with it. (Here is a must-have for any true fan: The Complete Calvin & Hobbes). The strip works on at least two levels. There is the philosophical level where Calvin and his tiger discuss topics of science, philosophy and religion that are clearly far beyond the grasp of a six-year old mind and yet are questions most people wrestle with during their lives. And then there is the more realistic level, where Calvin is just a young boy doing what boys do: learning to ride a bike, going to school, imaging himself as a superhero or astronaut, building snow forts, fighting with girls, and digging for treasure. Every young boy is convinced that there's treasure everywhere. Any boy with a strong imagination will realize that there truly is treasure everywhere.

The more I have thought about different topics, the more I've realized that there is theology everywhere. And this is what motivates me to write; it's what motivates me to read and to think and to explore. Everywhere I turn I see theology, whether in a book about the atoning work of Jesus Christ entitled Jesus' Blood and Righteousness: Paul's Theology of Imputation or in a book about the future of business called The Long Tail. Sometimes the theology is lying on the surface, exposed and easy to see. Sometimes it is hidden within and just needs to be coaxed out. But always there is something to think about, something to wrestle with, something to help me think deeply about how Christians are to live in this world.

Now don't get me wrong here. I'm not one of these people who watches R-rated movies and tries to read into them some kind of redemptive theology that is simply not present. I won't ever be writing The Gospel According to Kill Bill. But it seems that every time I read the news and every book I read I find something that is profound, something that is or should be theological. Everything I read seems to provide some starting point for deeper reflection.

I know, and am convinced, that there's a theology of everything. There's treasure everywhere. And I get such a thrill out of finding it.