Your Path is Here, Arise and Walk
Ants are truly fascinating creatures. In his book Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software, the author Steven Johnson points out some of the ways that groups of ants function like neural pathways in the human brain.
We can learn a lot from ants. Like humans, ants are built to be social animals. What we see as an ant hill is just the surface view of the highly organized societies in which ants live and work together. These communities of ants are called colonies.
Ant colonies are so united toward their common purpose of survival and growth that they behave like a single organism, or WHAT BIOLOGISTS CALL A “SUPERORGANISM.” The behavior of any single individual ant doesn't make as much sense as the collective.
Just as an individual ant has different body parts that fit and work together, an ant superorganism has multiple colony members that cooperate to accomplish extraordinary feats. This social behavior gives ants a major advantage over solitary insects and other animals.
In an ant colony, nestmates work together to do the things required to survive. This process is made more efficient through division of labor. Some ants focus on certain jobs, while other ants do a different job. We’re familiar with this. It’s how humans work together.
The queen has the very specific role of laying eggs, which she spends most of her life doing. However, despite her size and royal title, THE QUEEN DOESN’T BOSS THE WORKERS AROUND. Instead, workers decide which tasks to perform themselves.
This is where things get interesting. IN AN ANT COLONY, NO SINGLE ANT – NOT EVEN THE QUEEN – IS THE “BOSS.” NO ANT IS DIRECTING THE OTHER ANTS TO, SAY, REPAIR THE NEST, OR GATHER FOOD, OR TAKE CARE OF THE NEWLY HATCHED YOUNG.
Ants are capable of something much greater than the small anthill you may have in your front yard in summer. There is a colony of ants on an island in Japan covering an area of 670 acres. Another stretches along the Mediterranean in Southern Europe for over 3,700 miles.
HOW ARE ANTS CAPABLE OF MASSIVE ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURES LIKE THIS WITHOUT ANY CENTRALIZED LEADERSHIP? Members of an ant colony ‘talk’ with one another to coordinate their activities, but they never have to raise their voices.
Instead, ants communicate mainly using chemicals, called pheromones, which they smell with their antennae. Workers release pheromones with specific messages, such as “Follow me to food!” or “Attack the intruder!” or “Newly hatched eggs, come with me to the nest.”
Each individual ant has a tiny brain. But all the ants of a colony combined are pretty smart. Ant superorganisms can solve difficult problems by processing information as a group. For example, a colony can compare potential nest sites before collectively choosing the best one.
ANTS CAN COMPLETE SUCH COMPLEX TASKS AS A GROUP PRECISELY BECAUSE NO SINGLE ANT IS GIVING THE COMMANDS. You see, each ant COULD BE a food-getter, or an intruder-attacker, or a new-hatchling-taker-carer.
In fact, a given ant could get the pheromone signals from the ants around it in the morning to become a food-getter. And then in the afternoon, that same ant might get a new signal to start working on nest building. ANY ANT CAN ALSO BE THE TRANSMITTER OF SUCH SIGNALS.
ANTS DYNAMICALLY CHANGE THEIR FOCUS BASED ON THE CHEMICAL SIGNALS OF OTHER ANTS AROUND THEM. A solitary insect would not be able to weigh as many options, and could more easily make a mistake.
The correct decisions are thus made at the colony level, without any centralized control center making the decisions. Each individual ant is simply responding to other ants around it. If an ant gets no specific signal, it just keeps bouncing around the colony until it gets some direction.
BECAUSE ANY ANT CAN TRANSMIT SIGNALS, AND ALL OTHER ANTS CAN PICK UP THOSE SIGNALS AND CHANGE THEIR OWN FOCUS, ANT COLONIES BEHAVE LIKE A SINGLE, LARGE ORGANISM, NOT MERELY A COLLECTION OF SMALLER INDIVIDUALS.
One ant by itself cannot do much by way of building and defending a nest, foraging for, collecting, or storing food. But IN A COLONY OF ANTS, A SORT OF COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE EMERGES THAT IS GREATER THAN ANY INDIVIDUAL ANT BY ITSELF.
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ANT COLONIES ARE CAPABLE OF THESE INCREDIBLE FEATS OF SELF-ORGANIZATION BECAUSE ANTS ARE RADICALLY OPEN TO NUDGES THEY GET FROM OTHER ANTS AROUND THEM. We can learn a lot about how to be good Christians from this.
To explain why, let’s quickly review some of what we’ve been talking about together the past few months. We have talked about how human nature is a combination of Self-Will and God’s Will. HUMANS ARE MADE UP OF THE ABILITY TO DO “MY WILL,” OR TO DO “THY WILL.”
We know that while we always have God available to us,we also need to seek God. Why? James 2:14 “What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them?”
WHY ARE WE CALLED TO SEEK GOD’S WILL? Because we are called to “such faith,” a faith that produces action. Ephesians 2:8-10: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith… not by works, so that no one can boast.”
WE ARE SAVED THROUGH FAITH, NOT WORKS, BECAUSE IF IT WERE WORKS THAT MATTERED, OUR PRIDE WOULD GET IN THE WAY. BUT WHAT KIND OF FAITH? “SUCH FAITH,” THE SORT OF FAITH THAT PRODUCES ACTION.
This action is more than simply “not doing bad.” WE BECOME GOOD BY DOING GOOD, NOT BY SIMPLY AVOIDING DOING WRONG. This is what Jesus meant when the Pharisees asked him “which of these 600 laws are most important” and He answered “these other two laws.”
Jesus answered the Pharisees “love God,” and “love your neighbor.” JESUS DOES NOT SIMPLY LAY OUT TWO MORE RULES TO FOLLOW WHEN HE GUIDES US TO LOVE UP TO GOD AND LOVE OUT TO ONE ANOTHER. HE “FULFILLS THE LAW” WHEN HE DOES SO.
WE LOVE UP TO GOD IN ORDER TO LOVE OUT TO OTHERS. AND SOMETIMES, AS IN WHEN WE FORGIVE SOMEONE ELSE, WE LOVE OUT TO OTHERS IN ORDER TO BETTER LOVE OUT TO GOD. This is the fulfillment of the Law. That we are a channel of God’s grace.
What is the enemy of trying to live in God’s Will? Pride. Because pride is the enemy of seeking God. Psalms 10:4 “In their pride the wicked do not seek God.” Pride is also the enemy of doing God’s Will with a pure heart. This is why we are called to “such faith,” not saved by “works.”
We live in the world. We are all bouncing around our own little ant hills. We must take actions with others to live. How do we know which actions to take if we don’t try and live in God’s Will? IF WE ARE NOT TRYING TO DO GOD’S WILL, WE ARE TRYING TO DO GOD’S JOB.
If we are not trying to do God’s Will, we are living in Self-Will. And that means we call all the shots, we make all the big decisions, we think we know what’s best for ourselves. Who does that make us? God. It means we are trying to play God in our own lives.
We are called to trust God. We allow God to help us get ourselves out of our own way. To do that, we allow Him to burn away our Self-Will and try to continue to act in God’s Will. We need Him to help us burn away the pride we have when we think “I got this. I can do it alone.”
Malachi 3:2-3 “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver….”
GOD’S REFINING FIRE BURNS AWAY OUR PRIDE, that most powerful of hindrances to seeking God, and to acting in God’s Will. Job 23:10 “But he knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.”
When we put ourselves into the care of God, when we live in a way that trusts Thy Will and not My Will, God’s refining fire can be used to burn away our pride and our desire to live in Self-Will.
The refining fire opens us to live beyond the old law of “an eye for an eye” and instead to “turn the other cheek.” And what does a fire produce? The refining fire mentioned in Malachi, and Job? Light.
John 8:12 “When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.’” THE LIGHT OF LIFE. LIGHT OPERATES ACCORDING TO THE LAW OF GRACE.
Fire provides warmth and light to all those around it. One fire can light many more. A single flame in a village can provide warmth and light to all those around. This is how the Law of Grace works. In Earthly Law, “possessions” only nourish the person who actually has.
John 1:5 “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:17 “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” THE LAW OF GRACE – THE LAW OF LIGHT AND TRUTH – WAS GIVEN TO US BY JESUS CHRIST.
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What does all this have to do with ants and ant colonies? ANT COLONIES HAVE EVERYTHING TO DO WITH TRUST. The ants themselves might not realize this. But we humans would describe it that way: trusting the signal you get, and trusting what happens when you follow it.
Ant colonies would hardly work if the ants were going about their business, bouncing around, when suddenly: one gets a signal to help get food! They follow the signal as fast as they can, and gets to where the food’s supposed to be, and it’s a prank. Other ants are hiding, laughing.
WE HAVE TO TRUST THE SIGNAL WE GET. On the other hand, imagine the same ant, going about their business, and gets the same signal to help with food. But the ant is worried that if they follow and help with the food, no one will repair their corner of the nest.
SO WE ALSO HAVE TO TRUST WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE FOLLOW THE SIGNAL. We must have full trust in God. That means faith not only in what we’re called to do, but also that what we don’t do as a result won’t result in the end of the world.
WE HAVE TO TRUST GOD, BOTH IN WHAT WE DO, AND IN THE OUTCOME. That second part is much more difficult. Take an example of someone committing a wrong against us. We don’t need to do a whole lot of praying to know WHAT we should do in that situation: forgive.
THE OUTCOME IS MORE DIFFICULT TO TRUST. What should we do when we feel slighted? Forgive. That’s the “what.” Trusting that it won’t matter if we come across as the person in the wrong because we forgave? Trusting we won’t look weak? That’s much more difficult.
TRUSTING THE OUTCOME IS MORE DIFFICULT BECAUSE IT INVOLVES TRUSTING EACH OTHER. In this forgiveness example, you can see this clearly. We don’t want to “come across” as the person in the wrong. We don’t want to “look weak.” We don’t want to “appear wrong.”
Have you ever thought about what the exact opposite of trust might be? I looked it up in Webster’s dictionary, and according to that book, antonyms for “trust” include “hold, keep, retain, withhold, own, possess…” THE OPPOSITE OF TRUST IS CONTROL.
A DESIRE TO CONTROL GENERALLY COMES FROM FEAR. If we are going through this sermon together and suddenly: there is a bear in the room! What would our bodies tell us to do? Our bodies tell us to control the object of fear, to kill the bear, or distract it, or hide from it.
SIGNALS OF FEAR AFFECT US ON A DEEPLY BIOLOGICAL LEVEL. If a bear were to suddenly appear, the amygdala deep in the middle of our brains would go to work. It alerts your nervous system, which sets your body’s fear response into motion. You can do nothing about this.
Stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline would be released. Your blood pressure and heart rate increase. You start breathing faster. Even your blood flow changes — blood actually flows away from your heart and into your limbs, making it easier for you to run for your life.
When we are afraid, our bodies prepare us for something called “fight-or-flight.” As you can see from the broken down description of what’s happening in our bodies when we are afraid, it’s both an intense reaction, and it’s totally involuntary.
Back to ant colonies. Ant colonies work because ants trust the signals they get, and because they trust the outcomes of following the signals. What does this have to do with us? TYPICALLY, THE SIGNALS WE HEAR IN OUR ANT COLONY ARE ENTIRELY FEAR-BASED.
The signals we see in our communities are the homes we live in, the cars we drive, the clothes we wear, the places we travel and the things we do. In other words, our default setting as humans ants is to receive signals about THINGS, AND FEAR OF NOT HAVING THEM.
DON’T BELIEVE ME? CONSIDER THIS DESCRIPTION OF A TYPICAL ADVERTISEMENT ON TELEVISION. A car is parked in a driveway outside on a typical suburban street. A man – a Dad – goes to his car with his hands full of sports equipment. He’s taking the kids to practice.
But Dad’s hands are so full of stuff he’ll never be able to get the practice equipment into the trunk. Look at him: he’s bobbling his armful of equipment around now, as he walks from the front door to the trunk of the car. The kids are running around, not helping at all.
And here’s the worst part. To one side of Dad, his neighbor Bob, older and wiser-looking than Dad, is outside doing lawn work. He frowns and shakes his head disdainfully at Dad. On the other side of Dad is his neighbor Lisa. She’s watering her flowerbed. She also frowns.
Dad looks like an idiot! Bob thinks so. Lisa thinks so. What is Dad going to do? Dad uses some gadget to open his trunk for him, successfully deposits all the practice equipment into the trunk, loads the kids into the car, and drives away. Dad smiles to himself. That’ll show them!
Americans spend on average 3.1 hours a day watching TV. Each hour of TV contains between 12 and 17 minutes of ads. So THE AVERAGE AMERICAN SEES BETWEEN 37 AND 53 MINUTES OF ADS PER DAY ON TELEVISION. THESE ADS ARE ENTIRELY BASED ON FEAR.
Back to the example ad storyline. What is the car company selling? The gadget to open the trunk for you? Sort of. WHAT THIS AD IS REALLY SELLING IS A WAY TO ESCAPE FEAR – Dad’s fear that Bob will think he’s a dolt, that Lisa thinks he could be a better father.
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THIS HYPOTHETICAL AD IS SELLING AN ANTIDOTE TO THE FEAR OF WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK OF US. We are instructed in Colossians 3:1-2 “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above… Set your minds on things above, not on Earth.”
WE ARE CALLED AS CHRISTIANS TO SET OUR MINDS ABOVE THE WORLD. TO SET OUR MINDS ABOVE THINGS. The car ad is trying to sell you a thing. For sure. But what’s harder on us is the way ads go about doing that. They try to make you afraid.
Saint Augustine was a theologian and philosopher who lived around 350-450AD, and whose writings I have learned a lot from about this topic. In his work “Confessions,” Augustine asks “What do I love when I say I love my God? The name of God is a HOW, not a WHAT.”
As Earth-bound humans living in the material world, we are accustomed to understanding, explaining — even loving — “things.” What this quote from Augustine reminds me is that God is not a “thing.” GOD IS NOT A CONCEPT. GOD IS A SET OF ACTIONS, A WAY WAY TO LIVE.
Again from Augustine’s “Confessions” is a quote I love dearly. “Solvitur ambulando,” which translates as “it is solved by walking.” In my past corporate life, I would often tell consulting clients that taking a step in the wrong direction and correcting is better than standing still.
WE ARE CALLED AS CHRISTIANS TO SUCH FAITH, A FAITH THAT PRODUCES FRUIT OF ACTION. Augustine continues “If you are pleased with what you are, you have stopped already. If you say, ‘It is enough,’ you are lost. Keep on walking, moving forward, trying for the goal.”
We might talk about God like He is a concept. In fact, to talk about God at all, we have to put words around his irreducible glory. But that is a function of the limitations of our human minds, of how we understand our material reality, and of how we use language. God is beyond all that.
WHEN WE SAY WE ‘KNOW’ GOD, WHAT WE MEAN IS THAT WE EXPERIENCE GOD AS PART OF THE PROCESS OF LIVING OUR LIVES IN FAITH. While God is most certainly a “being” – in fact, God is very much The Being – the way we experience God is as a process of “becoming.”
This is why we need ‘SUCH FAITH.’ FAITH THAT PRODUCES ACTION, as we’re told in James. ACTION, NOT DEEDS, which we know from Ephesians do not save us. Because deeds are the work of pride, and pride keeps us from being a channel of God’s grace.
AS CHRISTIANS, WE FOLLOW THE SIGNALS OF LOVE AND GRACE FROM GOD, NOT THE SIGNALS OF FEAR AND SELF-WILL FROM THE WORLD. The world tells you “look out for yourself and hoard wealth, my child! It is the only way you will be happy.”
God tells us “the only way to be truly happy is through service and charity.” In our worldly ant colony, we hear the signal from around us: “ants we don’t recognize! Keep them out! Protect the colony!”
And yet Jesus tells us “invite them in, keep them warm, feed them something to eat.” The signal we get from the world is “be afraid deep in your soul about how you compare to other people, and work your entire life to try and end up at the top of the human heap!”
God tells us “be afraid of nothing, because I love you and value you and have created you specifically for something special.” ALL OF LIFE IS DISCERNING BETWEEN THESE TWO SIGNALS.
ALL OF LIFE IS DISCERNING BETWEEN THE SIGNALS OF THE WORLD, OF FEAR, OF SELF-WILL, OF DOING GOD’S JOB FOR HIM, AND THE SIGNALS OF WHAT IS HOLY, AND FULL OF GRACE, AND RIGHT AND JUST… GOD’S WILL.
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HOW DO WE DO THIS? We get plenty of guidance from the Bible. FIRST, TRUST IN GOD. Proverbs 3:5-6. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”
SECOND, PRAY TO GOD. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” This means that we should be in constant communication with God, asking for His help and guidance.
THIRD, STUDY THE BIBLE. The Bible is God's word to us, and it contains everything we need to know about Him and His will for our lives. 2 Timothy 2:15, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one…who correctly handles the word of truth.” Read the Bible regularly.
LAST, AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, FOLLOW THE EXAMPLE OF JESUS. Matthew 16:24, “Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.’”
THESE ARE THE BASIC INGREDIENTS THE BIBLE GIVES FOR US TO FOLLOW TO DISCERN BETWEEN THE TWO SIGNALS: THE SIGNALS OF THE WORLD AND SELF-WILL, AND THE SIGNALS OF WHAT IS HOLY AND GOD’S WILL.
BUT THERE IS ALSO A SECRET INGREDIENT. AND THE SECRET INGREDIENT IS ABOUT HOW WE SHINE THE LIGHT OF GOD THROUGH THE UNIQUE JOURNEY THROUGH THIS LIFE THAT EACH ONE OF US IS GIVEN.
Romans 12:4-5 “For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.”
EACH OF US HAS A SPECIAL PURPOSE TO GOD. WE WERE CREATED TO FOLLOW HIS WILL, TO DO SPECIFIC TASKS FOR HIS PURPOSES DURING OUR LIVES HERE IN THIS WORLD. LIKE THE ANTS WORKING TOGETHER, EACH OF US HAS A ROLE TO PLAY.
1 Peter 4:8-10, “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. 9 Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. 10 Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.”
LIVING IN GOD’S WILL IS NOT ALWAYS A LIGHTNING BOLT MOMENT. FEW OF US SHOULD EXPECT TO HAVE A MOSES-LIKE EXPERIENCE. FOR THE VAST MAJORITY OF US, DOING GOD’S WORK IS SIMPLY LIVING OUR DAILY LIVES IN GOD’S WILL.
Remember: light is created in a process requiring energy. In the natural world, this comes from fire. The fire of the sun shines light on us. Our campfires shine light. The lamps people in Jesus’ time lit up homes and villages.
IT IS THROUGH REDEMPTIVE FIRE THAT WE LEARN TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN SIGNALS OF THE WORLD AND SIGNALS FROM GOD. WE LOOK FOR WAYS TO ALLOW GOD TO BURN AWAY OUR SELF-WILL, AND AT THE SAME TIME MAKE WAY FOR GOD’S GRACE.
Here is a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. “But through the power of love Lincoln transformed an enemy into a friend. It was this same attitude that made it possible for Lincoln to speak a kind word about the South during the Civil War when feeling was most bitter.
Asked by a shocked bystander how he could do this, Lincoln said, ‘Madam, do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?’ This is the power of redemptive love.” THIS IS THE POWER OF REDEMPTIVE LOVE.
WHEN THE WORLD TELLS US TO BE AFRAID, TO PAY BACK EVIL WITH EVIL, TO MAINTAIN AN ENEMY, GOD BECKONS US TO TRUST, TO LOVE IN THE FACE OF HATE, AND TO TURN AN ENEMY INTO A FRIEND.
The poet Antonio Machado was born in Seville, Spain, in 1875. He moved to Madrid, then to Paris to study literature and write poetry. In 1909, he fell in love with a woman named Leonor, and they were married. But three years later, in 1912, she contracted Tuberculosis and died.
Leonor died just a few weeks after the publication of Machado’s first book of poetry. He spent the next ten years writing about the loss and grief he experienced, and by maintaining his FAITH THROUGHOUT HIS SUFFERING he came away with some beautiful insights.
Traveler, your footprints are the only road, nothing else.
Traveler, there is no road; you make your own path as you walk.
As you walk, you make your own road, and when you look back
you see the path you will never travel again.
Traveler, there is no road; only a ship's wake on the sea.
Augustine tells us later in the Confessions, “Go forth on your path, as it exists only through your walking.” Following God's path is not always easy, but it is the only way to live our lives. And the alternative of living in Self-Will is far more troublesome.
When we follow God, He will lead us to a life of peace, joy, and purpose. We may not always know what our next step is to be. But when we trust the nudges that God gives us day to day, we know that where we'll end up is worth the journey.
