Master-Planned

(Mental Hygiene Series)

10.     “Even if I turn out to be wrong, I shall bet my life on the assumption that this world is not idiotic, neither run by an absentee landlord, but that today, this very day, some stroke is being added to the cosmic canvas that in due course I shall understand with joy as a stroke made by the architect who calls himself Alpha and Omega.” (Clyde Kilby)

Master-Planned Communities are popular in the Texas. These are towns in which residential houses, commercial building and recreational parks and facilities are all planned and platted out for the entire development before anything is built. Unlike subdivisions, which may have  houses, common areas, and a neighborhood park planned out in advance, master-planned communities design an entire town at once—shopping centers, office parks, schools, churches, gated housing subdivisions, even the garbage dump.  I’ve been to these master-planned towns. I find them unnatural and soulless. These towns usually cater to the wealthy who would prefer to keep themselves gated off from the less fortunate. When I stroll by the man-made lakes, and contrived market places, I wonder who the ‘master’ was behind these plans.
 

I’ve also been in towns with no zoning, where everything is built ad-hoc, as the need arises. Schools and churches are built next to the bus or train station and sidewalk vendors sell everything imaginable to passers-by. Although this can be a bit more interesting environment, this too is man-made.
 

This is why I enjoy getting away from population centers where humans have yet to mess up nature. I have been to some places that are truly Master-Planned--where the mountains meet oceans and un-manicured forests sustain living creatures. At night, the stars are mesmerizing, with no city lights to obscure them. Yes, there is pain, suffering, death and decay—nothing is gated-off in nature. I don’t like these aspects of nature, because I don’t understand the purpose behind them. Yet, I cannot deny that I sense that God has master-planned all of nature—the glorious and the ignominious. He is the Designer, the Architect, and every detail has been planned out from beginning to end.
 

“I’m the Beginning, I’m the Conclusion. From Water-of-Life Well I give freely to the thirsty. Conquerors inherit all this. I’ll be God to them, they’ll be sons and daughters to me.” (Revelation 21:6 MSG)