Chicken Pot Pie x radius / 2C + JFK =

Well, people have often said "I'd like to spend a day in your mind and see what goes on there." Now that I have a blog, I can let people in a bit. It's Tuesday morning, at 2:14 am and I couldn't sleep beacuse I had a problem running through my head. I was trying to ponder the meaning of the word "thing". What is "thing"? The word "thing" is such a crazy word. It's next to impossible for me to think of a definition of the word "thing" without using "thing" to describe "thing". Go ahead and try. See? You can't do it! What the crap?!

What is a "thing"? Is a Flubbernutter a thing? Yeah. It must be physical...but then again, can 'thought' be called a "thing"? Yeah, and 'thought' is not physical? So a "thing" is not just physical, or exclusively physical. Must be that a "thing" is a noun though.

But wait. Is running a "thing"? Yeah, and 'running' is a verb.

And is 'silently' a "thing"? Well, saying that something is moving silently describes a thing about that which is moving (notice how the word "thing" appears in that statement twice). So it's now like an adjective?

Is 'infinity' a "thing"? Uh, yeah. But 'infinity' is like an abstract concept (though still a noun).

A "thing" can be, like, a state of affairs too. People often say "How are things going"? My brain is starting to spin...

I'm trying to think of anything that is not a "thing" (there it pops up again...'anything'...man! This word is sneaky!), but I can't. So a "thing" is a noun, or a verb, or an adjective...and a "thing" is either coporeal (physical) or incoporeal (non-physical). A "thing" may be static (unchanging, like the laws of logic) or dynamic (changing and developing, like affection for a person). "Thing" is like this completely bizarre word that is both exclusive and all-inclusive at the same time. How can all things (DANGIT!) be a "thing"?

Hmmm. Now to factor in Van Till. What if God is "thing". Not 'a thing', but simply "thing". And if God is "thing", then all "things" find reference in "thing", namely God. So if God is the noun,verb, adjective, coporeal, incoporeal, static, dynamic, etc. all wrapped up in "thing", then all these random and seemingly disjointed concepts that I associate with "thing" somehow find ultimate referent in the nature and character of God, who is "thing", in reference to which all other "things" are known. So, could it be that the only way my mind can somehow grasp the concept of "thing", which I can somewhat fathom and yet somehow not understand in the slightest, is because I somewhat know God? And, in the knowing of God as "thing" (though that knowledge must somehow be ingrained and not necessarily consciously articulated...uh, like in "general revelation"?), can I then process certain aspects of "thing" (i.e. God) independently, calling them "things" (like "chair", "joy", "time", "run", "foolishly"), without being able to comprehensively fathom "thing" simply because I cannot comprehensively fathom God as "thing" and yet still, in some inscrutable way, knowing God as "thing"? Hmm. Well, for those of you who were ever wondering what I ponder late at night, you've got your peek. I figured that I'd better write this down before I fell asleep and then forgot about the "thing" I was thinking about before I went to sleep that kept me up for like 2 hours.

Man. God's mind must be so unbelievably huge that God, being "thing", has perfect knowledge of himself as "thing" and thereby all referents to "thing" (which would be all "things"). Grasping the mind of God is like trying to wrestle and pin a stream of oatmeal blasting from a firehose. If you can even process that statement into a sensical image, you win a free weiner dog and myself and the other Kennedys salute you. Good Night,

The Armchair Theologian