The Thing That Will Be

For miles all the eye can see is bare crimson earth. There are no sun-bleached trees or tall staggering cacti. No rolling dunes and no tumbleweeds. No rocks either, only pebbles and hints of gritty sand. The only real stimulants are the occasional cracks and crevasses.

It’s not a very becoming desert but a desert no doubt.

You are there. But like the barren landscape, you are alone.

That would be, until it shows up.

†

Just as it had happened before, something appeared. However, there was something very peculiar about this encounter.

It was nothing and at the same time something. It was a being like you and me. However, unlike you and me it had no actual or physical composition.

It was like rippling black smoke trying to take on a shape. Any shape it did assume flickered and sputtered like a candle. It was nearly something but not quite nothing.

What forms would/did it assume, you don’t know. Maybe a man, no a bear, no wait a hog, you can’t discern. Like flashes of lighting it appeared to constantly and instantaneously change.

Furthermore, its form would appear to be an amalgamation. It would never appear to be just a deer or just an eagle. Rather, it would look as if it had the antlers of a deer and the face of an eagle.

Even so, you were never actually sure of any given shape. Are those the legs of a frog or a rabbit? Is that the body of a crocodile or an ape? You could never be certain.

Due to your uncertainty, it’s likely there wasn’t an amalgamation at all. Ironically, you are not sure of this either.

†

However, one thing that is certain: these are not certainties, only assumptions.

There was never an eagle head or even the appearance of one. Only something unknown which bears a faint resemblance of an eagle head. Or something so drastically unknown that the only thing that it can be likened to is an eagle head.

One may wonder at it like many do the fluttering flame. Pondering if is it the remembrance of a shape or perhaps the hope of one. Whatever it may be, you will have ash and stout before you have the answer.

†

There is only one way to comprehend its appearance: take a minute to think of the word “unknown.”

That’s what it is and that’s what it will always be. Unknown.

†

Regardless of its peculiarity, you were drawn to it. You were, in a word, infatuated. Your mind was full of thoughts such as, “Does it have scales, skin, or fur?” and “Will I be able to even physically feel it?”

You wanted to be certain. You wanted to be sure. You wanted to understand everything you could about this… this thing. Even if it could not be clearly seen, you wanted to do exactly that. Your desire to know coupled with its unknowableness left you frustrated.

†

Then as a beam of light shines on a moat of dust, a glimmer of hope shone upon your hungry soul.

It approached you.

Although its composition resembles smoke, its strides were awkward and mechanical. However, you effortlessly glossed over that. The dream of knowing could finally become a reality.

Then it spoke.

You were once held tight in the arms of hope. Only to be dropped to the floor by further bewilderment. The actuality that it spoke did not bewilder you. What it said is what puzzled you.

Three words and three words alone came out of its mouth. He said, “I will be.”

†

With His gravely and unnerving voice still ringing in your ears you waited. You were waiting for Him to finish His thought. But He never did.

In that moment you wanted to blurt out, “You will be what?” But you didn’t. Not before He vanished as peculiarly as He had appeared.

Where did He go? Will He be back? What will He be? What was He exactly? You have a thousand questions and no one to answer them. Each and every aspect of this mysterious encounter is unknown.

And perhaps that’s what He meant by “I will be.” Perhaps He meant that because you and I are not sure of the future, the things that will be are rendered unknown. Thus likening Himself to the future which is apparent, expected, and very real yet no less mysterious and unknown.

Like the future, in His entirety He is unbeknownst to you. In other words…

He will be.