ATONEMENT. BEAUTY.

The human soul screams in desperation to experience beauty.  There is something about aesthetic experiences that just make our hearts dance with a new light, and we are forever changed by the wonderfulness of life.  Art, music, nature, and all the other sources of beauty in this world improves the quality of our life, and right now I feel like I am alive in the thick of it.

I have been searching my computer for the last half hour looking for a document I made where I gave my own definition of what art is, but cannot find it.  Right now it is the one thing in this world I feel like I am terribly missing.  I wish I had it memorized better, but I think it may have gone like this...

Art is the outward and external expression of the inner and internal necessity to create beauty as we strive to bear the image of God.

I just got back from seeing Atonement  and it was beautiful.  It was absolutely stunning to me.  To anyone else it may seem slow, but to me I appreciated everything about it, and I can say that it has changed my life.  It has made my life better because it has provided me an aesthetic experience.  Maybe I sound crazy, but I think heaven will be a lot like this... the ultimate experience of beauty that God has reserved for his kingdom alone.

There is so much beauty in this film.  The lighting, the editing, the story, the sound, the music, it is all so beautifully constructed and easily one of the best films I have ever seen.  As far as beauty, it can sit alongside O' Brother Where Art Thou? on my list of all time favorites.  I recommend it to everyone, because I think that if more people experienced beauty in this world, the people in this world might just be a little bit better off.

Without diving too far into the plot, a young girl must live the rest of her life with the consequences of a mistake she has made.  The whole idea is that she has paid dearly with her life as atonement to what happened.  It made me sad, it hurt me to see this woman hurt, and I just got lost in this world of sadness.  I can't imagine living my whole life with regret, without love, with overwhelming guilt for a mistake made long ago.  I refuse to live my life making mistakes, living in guilt, or swallowing sadness into my belly to fill my emptiness.  By grace and by God's hand, I pray my life may be full and dramatically wonderful.  I want to know and experience the meaning of all this, and perhaps one day, die a brave spark amongst darkness.  Only to be delivered to my God and King on that day of triumphant glory.

I make no excuse now for my words... I find it so hard to be myself sometimes but I finally can say without hesitation that I live my life to experience God and beauty...