Where Will Life Take You?

Have you seen the new commercial from Louis Vuitton?

Entitled "A Journey," its message strikes a remarkable similarity to my purpose statement in creating this blog. I recommend you watch both the short version (with music and text) and the long version (music only). It is an artful piece that beautifully blends the familiar with the unexpected, creating a sense of calm while leaving you slightly unsettled with its stirring invitation to embrace life as a journey.

Here is the text of the commercial:

What is a journey?

A journey is not a trip.

It's not a vacation.

It's a process. A discovery.

It's a process of self-discovery.

A journey brings us face to face with ourselves.

A journey shows us not only the world,

but how we fit in it.

Does the person make the journey

or does the journey make the person?

The journey is life itself.

Where will life take you?

Of course, the implied message of A Journey is that life will somehow be better with expensive Louis Vuitton luggage and accessories. And it suggests that the destination of the journey is nothing more than the process, life itself. That's where I diverge from the self-oriented pursuit of consumption and the fatalistic end point of a mere earthly existence.

It makes for a great commercial but a lousy afterlife.

In the middle of Holy Week, we must ask ourselves a basic question. What's beyond the grave? If Jesus was crucified on Friday and raised from the dead on Sunday, which I believe He was, then our existence on earth is merely a prelude to something greater. A journey that extends beyond the here and now.

So where will life take you? I hope it takes you to the point where you find that greater something in Christ this Easter season.