Teens Talk - Math Doesn't Add Up!

The Grand Rapids Times
10-17-2008
By Marcel Gamble

Back in elementary school, when math didn’t add up right or when a problem was too difficult to find a solution for, my teacher use to take me back to the basics.
Not to insult or mock anyone’s intelligence in math, but I have to take you back because there is an equation that is not adding up correctly.
That equation once was solved that then became a problem and later on became problematic.
Every one remembers the infamous math equation of 1+1=2; if not, then take a mental note because the equation is key in the problem that I am about to discuss.
First, let’s begin with the solution of the number 2; you have a great nation of people that admires God and admires the life that God gives them.
Don’t worry, I am not referring to our nation today because our nation doesn’t resemble this.
All people in this nation are neighbors; they live for community, and they are willing to die for community.
The people in this community create a social welfare system amongst themselves and with God.
These individuals admiration for God expands so much that they decide to get as close as they can to God by building a tower that reached to the heavens.
Their ambitions aren’t to reach the heavens because they want to glorify God; they want to reach the heavens to glorify themselves.
Sometimes, in math you have to retrace your steps in order to check your problem; so I want to backtrack for you all.
The people didn’t want to reach the heavens to glorify God; they wanted to reach the heavens to glorify themselves.
This is where the equation changes significantly. The solution is no longer 2, now; the solution is one.
The divine response from God to this community for their actions was to confuse everyone’s languages within the community so that they could no longer communicate.
The confusing of the languages caused the people to disperse throughout the world, breaking the community apart. This is why the world is divided.
We live in a world that is divided because before we have a social welfare system with God we choose to have a welfare system amongst ourselves first.
We strive to get the solution back to the number 2; but then when we are in trouble ,we go to our best friend instead of God.
We rely on each other to provide the necessities that we need instead of depending on God.
You see, we will never find a solution to our problem because we are not ready to contribute to the equation.
We don’t have healthy communities today because we fail to recreate a social welfare system with God.
We have different communities within the church because the churches compete with each other.
We have so many different communities that exclude others because we are all glorifying ourselves and not God.
This gang hates that gang; this ball player despises that ball player, and this man is more important than that man because he is richer.
The people didn’t want to reach the heavens to glorify God, they wanted to reach the heavens to glorify themselves.
qThis is the picture of the world today; the equation is 2-1=1 because we live in a broken world with a distant relationship with God.
The community that the world had before the tower of Babel is the community that this world needs to transform back into.
The equation needs to be 1+1=2; God and we equal community.
I’m going to leave you all with this: God should come before anything.
Marcel Gamble is a student at Calvin College in Grand Rapids and a 2008 graduate of Kelloggsville High School.