Friday, June 19, 2009

A Periodic Table of the Elements of God (Periodic or eternal?)

It was a silly little assignment I gave myself. Create a Christian version of the periodic table for a decoration for our VBS. (Is there a better name than vacation bible school out there? Generic enough to use every year but without the words vacation or school?) Anyway, it turned into an education Project. What do I list, whats not important enough? How do I arrange it? Is there a Acid/Base continuum in spiritual matters?
So this is what I did:

You'll notice the bright yellow cells are the godhead. The Pink columns under them are not restrictive to the attributes of each deity personage but are suggestive. For example, the fruit of the spirit are listed under HS the Holy Spirit, with the exception of Faith and Love which are in the first column because of their importance.
The light blue areas on the right are man's responses, but there is an astericked footnote pointing out that God enables these responses.
Then the bridging purple cells are the things God does on man's behalf, for his good, and for God's glory.
OK, so I don't have the final judgment of mankind and the lake of fire, so sue me. I wanted to convey the "good news" of God and While He is Holy and Sovereign, Jesus came to seek and save the lost. That's good news, right?
I've copyrighted it and I would like to use it for teaching. Something like Sa=Gr+Fa.
But it is rather inadequate isn't it? I mean how do you confine all that Christ has done for us in salvation in just a few purple squares. How can you put Love in a square like its some discrete amount reduced to its most basic state. Love is much more faceted and convoluted than that yet it does have this basic component; doing whats best for another.
So if you would like a better version of this I can send the Excel file or the bmp and you can use it. Just ask me. OK, you can also make 4 reproductions of it, that's all, no more!
Maybe I can get lifeway or Group or somebody to reproduce it and market it. $$$$$. Or not.
But I do think it would be a good educational tool!
What do you think?

1 comment:

  1. Yay Dad! Yep, I already told you, but I really like this. I'll let you know if I think of anything to add!

    ReplyDelete

Feel free to tell me and others what you think. You can use the tools of rhetoric but please, be clean and nice.