THE AGITATED MIND

THE AGITATED MIND

Hannibal Lecter:

“…You’ve got everybody in moral dignity pants-nothing is ever anybody’s fault. Look at me, Officer Starling. Can you stand to say I’m evil? Am I evil, Officer Starling?”

Clarice Starling:

“I Think you’ve been destructive. For me it’s the same thing.”

Hannibal  Lecter:

“Evil’s  just destructive? Then storms are evil, if it’s that simple. And we have fire, and then there’s hail, Underwriters lump it all under the ‘Acts of God’”

Clarice Starling:

“Deliberate-“

Hannibal Lecter:

“I collect church collapses recreationally. Did you see the recent one in Sicily? Marvelous! The façade fell on sixty five grandmothers at a special Mass. Was that evil? If so who did it? If He’s up there, He just loves it, Officer Starling. Typhoid and swans-it all comes from the same place.”

-Silence Of The Lambs, Thomas Harris

 1Now on the same occasion there were some present who reported to Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. 2And Jesus said to them, “Do you suppose that these Galileans were greater sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered this fate? 3“I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. 4“Or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? 5“I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

-Luke 13:1-5

“The Lord is good to those who put their hope in Him. He is good to those who look to Him. It is good when people wait quietly for the Lord to save them I is good for a man to carry a heavy load of suffering while he is young.”

-Lamentations 3:25-27 (NIRV)

The goodness of God permeates the entire works of His creation. The Scriptures affirm the nature of God as good. God is fundamentally good and especially good to those who hope in Him; who wait in confidence for His mercies. God is especially good to the one who earnestly seeks, and longs for Him. To those who though in adversity can quietly trust in the Lord’s goodness. The Lord is especially good to the one who remains steadfast, full of hope waiting for the Lord’s salvation. This man waits patiently, quietly, silently, without complain or murmuring for the certainty of the Lord’s deliverance.

Living in this cruel, fallen, imperfect world may drive us to a hopeless  contradiction. But if we have no hope to whom shall we go? If we lose our faith we lose all hope.  Hope is essentially necessary to faith. Hopelessness and cynism is symptomatic of agitated hearts and minds without faith in the True and Living God, Who, despite our doubts or what we think  is still good.