I listened to these two TED talks recently, and I thought I'd share them. Like the nerdy western girl I am, I associated the word "ubuntu" with linux or something, but it turns out the word has a much richer heritage than I had known.
Here's the first, delivered just after the passing of Nelson Mandela, by Boyd Varty.
And here is the second, a much older TED talk that I stumbled upon today, by Chris Abani.
I have, in the last few years, wondered much about being made in the image of God, per Genesis 1:27, "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." I've wondered at God's lavishness, that he fashioned the created after the Creator, and I've wondered what it all means. I've wondered what it means for who we're supposed to be, and what it means when we choose to worship the True God over ourselves (Romans 1:23, "exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man..."), and how we're supposed to relate to each other. I mean, what does it mean to be human if by design we are image bearers of God? If before Eve and the Apple, in our most perfect condition, being human was being created in the image of God? I am still working out the day-to-day, the "walk by the Spirit" stuff in Galatians 5. Too often, I feel inadequate and wicked and broken, but I find myself returning over and over to the two greatest commandments:
“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matt 22:37-39)So Ubuntu. "I am because of you." "The only way for me to be human is for you to reflect my humanity back at me." Maybe Ubuntu can mean that as I love you-my-neighbor, and you love me-your-neighbor, we remind each other of the Creator who loved us first, who so lavishly fashioned us after himself. Maybe Ubuntu can mean that as I learn to love God with all of my heart and soul and mind, that I will look around and see his image in my neighbors, and I will learn to love them well. I don't know. But I like what Boyd Varty says when he talks about his friend Solly, who didn't think twice about saving him from the crocodile, because all life and death must be shared. And I like what Chris Abani says, quoting his mother, "The simple act of kindness from a complete stranger will unstitch you." And then I think of Philippians 2:
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.I wonder that maybe we are too jealous with our humanity, hoarding ourselves, when in fact the lavish God who made us in His image meant for it to be shared, like Christ who died on the cross to love God with all his heart and soul and mind, and to love us his neighbors and brothers. The Apostle Paul went on to write in that same letter to the Philippians, "Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. Likewise you also should be glad and rejoice with me."
