This week Ai Bao, a panda in a South Korean zoo/theme park, gave birth to twin baby panda cubs. If you look at the pictures however, you may wonder if something weird happened with the two girls. They are largely hairless, pink-skinned, skinny little things. Not exactly what you would think of when you think of “Panda”. They look a little more like moles.
Seeing Ai Bao’s twin girls reminded me of something C.S. Lewis once said in describing how this life connected to the Resurrection. This life, he said, will be like a young boy learning to read Greek. In this life we are learning the grammar, the syntax, the vocabulary – the way the language behaves. But all of that is a very different experience from reading Sophocles. It is utterly connected, but it is a very different thing. Apparently like a baby panda and a full grown one.
That’s a good reminder to us Christians, especially to those of us Christians who fancy ourselves as being in some way sophisticated. We can think that we are sophisticated in terms of our intellect or our Scripture knowledge or in our level of sanctification. But when it comes to what we will be when we are in the Resurrection with Christ – there will be no comparison. There will be connection, but it will be an all together different and more glorious experience. It’ll be the difference between grammar and poetry.
So what are we left to do? Simply to do a good job with the grammar that we are given to learn on this side of the Resurrection, and to look forward to something far greater that Christ has won for us – knowing that this is just grammar, and one day we will read poetry with Him.