Emergence

Emergence is a concept in science, philosophy and the arts that describes how order can arise out of seemingly random chaos. Basically, the whole that emerges is greater than the sum of its parts. For example, if you observe an individual termite, you will find that it is stupidly doing things at random. You observe another termite and you'll get the same thing - a dumb insect wandering around blindly with no kind of plan or agenda. But somehow, out of millions of seemingly random, stupid, unplanned and disorganized individual actions, a grand plan emerges. There exist species of termites that can build cathedral mounds up to thirty feet tall. They are incredibly sophisticated and are engineered in such a way to be extremely stable and to optimize temperature regulation. And all of this incredible order emerges from the seemingly random and stupid actions of individual termites. In a lot of ways, we are like those individual termites - making seemingly random and stupid actions that by all accounts should not produce anything that could possibly last or have any worth. We like to think ourselves smart. We like to plan and prepare and we believe that this will result in our inevitable success and will eliminate the possibility of failure. But so few of our plans work out, and for the ones that do, the end result never matches up with what we had imagined it would be. But we are also different from the termites, because we have a personal relationship with the Higher Power that is responsible for ensuring that a greater order arises from the random chaos that is our lives. We have the opportunity to trust God, and it does require trust. A termite could never properly appreciate the majestic scale of the mound it is helping to create, and not just because its brain is too tiny to hold concepts like awe and beauty. It is altogether too tiny in every respect, and can't appreciate the grandeur of the work in which it is involved because the mound is so, so much bigger than it is. God's thoughts are not our thoughts, and His ways are not our ways. The actions to which God inspires us to act may seem just as random and stupid and ugly as any we might come up with ourselves. In fact, they will often seem much more random, stupid and ugly than anything we could have dreamed of. How often have each of us thought if there really is a God and He really has a plan, then there is no possible way that [insert horrible life event here] could possibly add anything of worth or value or beauty. But we are like the tiny termite laboring in a forgotten tunnel with absolutely no idea that our struggles and sacrifices are all part of a marvelous work and a wonder. It is Ok that our life seems random and it makes no sense. There will come a day where our Heavenly Father pulls us back to His presence and unfolds before our eyes the indescribable glory and the infinite joy and the eternal beauty of His great and marvelous work, and, what's more, He will show us exactly how our part fits into the whole and we will weep for joy to finally understand that all of it, and especially the ugliest and blackest and most painful bits, was not random or wasted or useless or worthless, but was absolutely essential to our Father's great and marvelous and beautiful and wonderful Plan.