It has been an interesting week for the Morrow family in Toronto. We have been taking in some of the city’s culture. We visited the annual Toronto carnival on Saturday the 4th August.
I’m not quite sure what it was a celebration of, but it was most definitely a celebration of something and it attracted thousands of people.
On Monday the 6th August we visited the Royal Ontario Museum.
The museum had a spider exhibition. This was a celebration of everything spider.
The museum also had some magnificent displays of dinosaur bones and fossils celebrating a significant part of earth’s history.
One of my favourite exhibits was the Egyptian Mummy.
A glimpse into life not just from a bygone age, but an age that conjures images of some of scriptures most famous stories, such as Moses standing before Pharaoh demanding he set God’s people free.
The layout of the museum walked us through the ages and into the ancient Greek and Roman worlds. Busts of Roman emperors brought a different perspective to New Testament history as we got to put a face to some of the famous emperors who did so much to shape the life of the early church.
Yet throughout all the celebrations of culture something was missing.
Nowhere was there a celebration of Christian culture. The dinosaur section gave no indication of creation which depended on design. The Egyptian displays made no mention of any of the great biblical stories which did so much to shape that ancient nations history. Among all the Roman artefacts where were the nails made famous when used to crucify God’s son Jesus Christ.
Among all the music, dancing, colour and costumes of the parade the only reference I heard to Jesus was from a group of men who were more interested in debating Jesus skin colour as opposed to what he did while on this earth.
In a world fixated with culture it is time we as Christians and the church celebrate our culture, a culture rich in love and acceptance, a culture full of redemption and hope.