Have ball will play

There was a time, not so long ago, when youngsters could derive fun from the simplest of things. Washington found pleasure in unseating his squatting father and the great Sir Donald Bradman learnt to bat using a golf ball, which so attuned his eye that by the time he retired from world cricket he had established an unassailable record of 99.9 runs for every wicket he conceded. Newton also turned the simple pleasure of an apple into an idea, to which Einstein added, when an idea simply presents itself, then God speaks.

All over the world poor kids like the one in the picture, derive profound joy from flat balls, broken toys and unstringed instruments. My own boys have reshaped sticks, pipes, tubes, tables and whatever else they could lay their hands on, including the house and my face, to fulfill their insatiable quest for adventure, intrigue and fun. I once took them fishing along a river, with very basic equipment - though we caught nought, they had inexpressible fun just doing it.

When we were young we hid in storm water drains, created our own circus acts, shot with home made catapults and endless found ways to make noise. Such fun was not limited to children, either, for before the Internet and TV, whole families found simple pleasure in everyday, natural experiences.

But that has all changed now. It is no longer possible to be simple in this complex world, but even when we do invoke joy it is for a moment - the moment it takes for novelty to become passe. We are more easily dissapointed and let down, because our hedonistic world is geared to self-gratification, material pursuits and expensive toys.

Sadly our loss of simplicity extends to relationships - now we can longer sit down for a meaninful time to break bread with friends or to share simple moments with our families. Something is so wrong in all that. Jesus came to give us life and that abundantly, but we have spat on the essence of that life to live in the shadows of death and we have exchanged our natural wealth for the weak and beggarly residue of life.

(c) Peter Eleazar @ www.4u2live.net