Formed in His ImageSample

Recovering Good, True, and Beautiful

So far in this devotional, we’ve seen how beauty, the imagination, and the Good Life are central to the biblical story.

Another aspect in need of recovery is the notion of the true and good alongside beauty. Collectively, these are known as the transcendentals, meaning the irreducible qualities of being.

If this sounds strange to you, don’t worry. While Plato and Aristotle spoke of these qualities, it was later Christian theology that sharpened their usage and applied them to the being of God.

The transcendentals (goodness, truth, beauty) are the ultimate qualities of our experience that culminate in God. God is good, truth, and beauty. In The Magnificent Story: Uncovering a Gospel of Beauty, Goodness and Truth, James Bryan Smith observes, “​​Beauty, goodness and truth are life the Trinity, of one essence. When all three are aligned—beauty, goodness, and truth—you are dealing with reality at its deepest level.” Christian thinkers have also clarified our understanding of the transcendentals to understand that when one is present, they all are present. Therefore, if something is true it is also good and beautiful and so forth.

Thus, Christian formation asserts that the only true, good, and beautiful life is found in Jesus Christ.

But why goodness, truth, and beauty?

Why all this talk about goodness, truth, and beauty? Does it really matter?

It might sound like ivory-tower philosopher talk, but it’s quite practical. Though the concepts may be larger than life, they impact our daily lives in significant ways. This is because we live in a world that has completely neglected the transcendentals. In a modern world, we have lost a sense of the sacred.

The notion of mystery is all but removed, and our experience is reason-driven rather than faith-driven. This is true for much of the church as well. Formation has devolved into doing rather than being. What we do is vital, but what we do in our Christian life arises out of who we are and what we believe. Both in the world and in the church connection between the daily and the Divine is lacking.

We have also lost our sense of what it means to be “emplaced.” To be human is to mean we corporeally exist in a certain location at a certain time. The problem is our culture is always on the move. We can be virtually anywhere with the tap of a screen. Our physical existence is increasingly devalued while our digital experience is continually prioritized. In other words, we can determine our place rather than our place determining us. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t move for a job or school, but Christians need to recover a sense of place to be fully formed disciples of Christ.