The world looks so much different from 30,000 feet, doesn't it, Lily?

Hmm? Yes, I suppose it does.

The water out there! The waves! There's so much more of it than any picture could ever capture.

Enough to flood a village, I suppose.

Well… Yeah, but it’s enough to feed hundreds of villages! If only we could take out all of the salt, it would be perfect. Like a liquid gold mine. A literal pool of life!

Right. And where would we put all of this salt? What would we do with it?

Well for starters, we could use it to cure meat and store it so we never run out of food. And then we could distribute it across the ice caps, slow down their melting.

…You know what I don't like about you, Sam? You're too optimistic. It irks me.

What's wrong with that? Happiness is supposed to be contagious.

Look at it this way: I'm the glass half-empty kind of girl; you're the glass half-full boy, the dreamer, the one who sets his expectations to unattainable heights. You’re going to crash and burn one day. And I'm going to sit back and laugh and tell you I told you so.

I think you’re wrong, Lily. The glass isn't half-empty or even half-full; the glass is always full. Just because only half of what’s in it is water doesn't mean that the air filling the rest of the cup doesn't count. And if you look at it that way, then the cup is always overflowing. Lily, we’re blessed beyond belief.

All I know is that if you set your standards low, you’ll never have to be disappointed when they’re not met.

And you should be ecstatic when they’re exceeded! But Lily, living life like that, expecting the worst and hoping for just okay? That’s not any way to live. That’s not what our fathers want for us. That’s not what our Father wants for us.

Look, okay, you can go on and on about your God, but that doesn't make me have any more faith in this screwed up world. For all you know, Nietzsche’s right: God is dead.

Just because bad things happen doesn't mean God doesn't love us, Lily. Please try to understand that. Usually what looks bad to us in the moment – or even years down the road – it has good side effects, or it helps somebody else. Sometimes He puts us in certain situations just so that we can help people who go through the same sort of thing later on.

But what’s the point? Why do we have to go through all of this garbage in the first place? I thought your “God” was supposed to love us. What is that one verse you quote all the time? “God is Love”?

He does love us, Lily. That’s the point. God is perfect; man is not. If it weren't for His Grace, we would be so much worse off than we are now. We wouldn't have the good days to balance out the bad. We wouldn't have the beauty of all of this around us. Lily, take a look at the world and tell me it wasn't crafted by our universe’s greatest artist.

Sam… We've been through this. Science explains it all.

Science explains everything, yes. I’m not arguing that. What I’m telling you, begging with you to believe, is that science is merely our human understanding of His masterpiece. Even those things which we think are random or imperfect, they were a choice made by God. A testimony that beauty comes in every form. It’s all around us. Beauty isn't what we deem perfect. Beauty is the Love of our God. Beauty is you, and beauty is me.

I so wish I could believe you, Sam…

All you have to do is let your heart go. He will find a way. Love will consume you, and you’ll see it too: just like this sapphire ocean beneath us, and all the world around us, you, Lily, are beauty in its truest form. Never forget that.

“You are altogether beautiful, my love; there is no flaw in you.”






~Song of Solomon 4:7 (ESV)