Plate Tectonics

Yes, plate tectonics is what really hit close to home with me this week. (I know, what a nerd) Last weekend I had the pleasure of watching a professional dance company perform, and what a treat it was! One of their works they presented was inspired by...wait for ITTTT!!!...plate tectonics! I remember watching the piece that concluded with a stunning duet occurring on stage as literally everything fell away around them. The backdrop and the side wings(sorry if I use stage lingo and lose you) dropped to the ground exposing the "backstage area" that only performers and technicians get to see. But this duet remained constant, and driving. The strength and power of these dancers kept pushing forward as their environment became more vulnerable as the "backstage" that is normal a mystery to the audience was being exposed! And yet the duet continued. Man and woman so connected that they moved about, around, separate and completely depended of one another.

"Beneath the earth's crust are plate tectonics, huge masses of rock that slowly, constantly move. Periodically they come up against one another and collide, resulting in an earthquake. The pressure, the crushing pressure, experience at the point where they collide is thlipis. The 'great tribulation,' literally, the mega thlipis, is what takes place when the kingdom of God invades the world and comes up against kingdoms that are inconsistent with it" (181)

What an amazing analogy! These constant plates moving underneath the world as we know it. Always in constant motion. Moving the way the Lord intends them to. We cannot control them, we cannot will them, and yet they continue on their paths. This is the then, the now, and the future of the Lamb's work. The constant motion, the constant moving toward an end, and what an end indeed! "Implying that something was happening then, in A.D. 96; and something is happening now!" (180)

The mega thlipis happened then, and is still happening now when "God's kingdom collides with the kingdoms of humanity in rebellion against God." (181)

Thank you LORD for the gift of sight! To see the human representation and interpretation of the mega thlipis. Viewing the constant driving motion occurring through two humans to represent something so much greater than themselves. So much greater then they can ever know. As their surroundings fell away from behind the performers, suddenly nothing else was important. Nothing else existed. Nothing but the clashing of the Kingdom of our slain Lamb who paid the ultimate price for our sin, and the kingdoms colliding with it.