Bear the Cross, It Will Bear You

The Imitation of Christ, Thomas a Kempis

For verily it is not deep words that make a man holy and upright; it is a good life which maketh a man dear to God.

I had rather feel contrition than be skillful in the definition thereof. 

He only is truly great, who hath great charity.

If thou wouldst profit by thy reading, read humbly, simply, honestly, and not desiring to win a character for learning.

As oft as I have gone among men, so oft have I returned less a man.

Two things specially avail unto improvement in holiness, namely firmness to withdraw ourselves from the sin to which by nature we are most inclined, and earnest zeal for that good in which we are most lacking.

Let nothing be great, nothing high, nothing pleasing, nothing acceptable unto thee, save God Himself or the things of God.

Thou art none the holier if thou art praised, nor the viler if thou art reproached.

If thou willingly bear the Cross, it will bear thee. . . .  If thou cast away one cross, without doubt thou shalt find another and perchance a heavier.

For a little reward men make a long journey; for eternal life many will scarce lift a foot once from the ground.

 The prudent lover considereth not the gift of the lover so much as the love of the giver.

 My Son, he who striveth to withdraw himself from obedience, withdraweth himself also from grace, and he who seeketh private advantages, loseth those which are common unto all.

He is not truly patient who will only suffer as far as seemeth right to himself and from whom he pleaseth.

Strive, My Son, to do another's will rather than thine own. Choose always to have less rather than more. Seek always after the lowest place, and to be subject to all. Wish always and pray that the will of God be fulfilled in thee. Behold, such a man as this entereth into the inheritance of peace and quietness.

Hold fast the short and complete saying, 'Renounce all things, and thou shalt find all things; give up thy lust, and thou shalt find rest.'

It is not really a small thing, when in small things we resist self.

How many have been injured by their virtue being made known and too hastily praised.

All reason and natural investigation ought to follow faith, not to precede, nor to break it. 

I find it hard to group all the thoughts in The Imitation of Christ.  I will use the title as the main theme.  I guess it shows that imitating Christ, being his disciple, is simple in its meaning, but profound in its implications and manifold in its expression.

I am impressed with a Kempis' continual reminder that thinking about discipleship or talking about discipleship is not the same as practicing and doing it. Also that doing discipleship without the inner growth and change of self-denial and passion for God and his ways.

As far as mere talk, he criticizes mere book learning that can define the things of God without experiencing them and engage in learning for the inflation of ourselves with a "character of learning" rather than humility of a real disciple.  "Deep words" do not make a disciple, but a "good life."

As far as mere good deeds, he points out how a person may make a show of patience or virtue without really being virtuous at all because he picks and chooses the recipients of his virtue.  It is possible for people to be "injured by their virtue," when it is too quickly or too often praised.  In the end all good deeds, like reason and learning, need to proceed from faith and not precede or break it.

In particular, The Imitation expresses how I might take up the cross and follow Jesus.  Jesus said there would be no following him without first taking up his cross.  In short, a Kempis recommends this saying as central: "Renounce all things, and you will find all things; give up your desires, and you will find rest."  This is a picture of the cross of Christ. About this saying he adds, "Dwell upon this in thy mind, and when thou art full of it, thou shalt understand all things.O Lord, this is not the work of a day, nor children's play; verily in this short saying is enclosed all the perfection of the religious."

Another way he puts this truth about self-denial is "If you willingly bear the cross, it will bear you." In following Christ, the cross is sufficient in bringing us to a powerful, full, and happy life because of the promise and reality of the resurrection. That is why by renouncing, I can gain. "Possessing nothing, but having everything." That is why by giving up my desires, I find peace. My true desire is found in Christ.

Such reading has been foreign to me.  I have had The Imitation recommended to me several times, but I have never been able to make it through until now.  Taking up the cross as self-denial and as destruction of the natural human abilities apart from God has seemed "over the top" and "Medieval" to me until I came face to face with desires and habits that threatened my marriage and my family.  Such desires and habits kept my learning from Christ inconsistent and powerless and emptied my heart of love for him and others.  When I finally saw how destructive these forces that lived in my life and body were, I understood the necessity of the cross.  I saw that only an overhaul would do, not the cosmetic surgery I was trying out.  Death was the answer, not merely coping.

So I can say and hope to live out this message: "If you willingly bear the cross, it will bear you."


Lord, I regret how long I have avoided the cross and fiddled around with mere talk and mere deeds.  I have not followed you with my whole heart, but have often left you to the side, only dabbling in the life you offer, not seeing its full glory and benefit.  Let me see your glory so that I may embrace your cross.  Let nothing be great, nothing high, nothing pleasing, nothing acceptable to me, except you and what you bring.  Amen.


I am reminded of a particular day when I gave up trying to fix myself.  I drove up to a stop sign and realized that I couldn't go forward or backward or left or right and find what would help me.  I had looked everywhere for relief from my desires and vices.  I had looked everywhere, except up.  So I looked to you and said, "Lead me and I will go.  I will do what you say.  Nothing else will work."  You are faithful.  You are enough.  I do not miss the things that I gave up to you that day, but hope to see them crucified completely in my life, so that I may be raised completely in your life.

The Devil's Best Work: Keeping God Out of Mind

The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis

It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out. (20)

[The Enemy] wants men to be concerned about what they do; our business is to keep them thinking about what will happen to them. (28)

The great thing is to direct his malice to his immediate neighbors whom he meets every day and to thrust his benevolence out to the remote circumference, to people he does not know. . . .  Think of your man as a series of concentric circles, his will being the innermost, hie intellect coming next, and finally his fantasy.  You can hardly hope, at once, to exclude from all the circles everything that smells of the Enemy: but you must keep on shoving all virtues outward till they are finally located in the circle of fantasy, and all the desirable qualities inward into the Will. (31)

Provided that meetings, pamphlets, policies, movements, causes, and crusades, matter more to him than prayers and sacraments and charity, he is ours - and the more "religious" (one those terms), the more securely ours.  I could show you a pretty cage-full down here. (35) 

You now see that the the Irresistible and Indisputable are the two weapons which the very nautre of His scheme forbids Him to use.  Merely to override the human will (as His felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for Him useless.  He cannot ravish.  He can only woo.  For His ignoble purpose is to eat the cake and have it; the creatures are to be one with Him, but yet themselves. (38)

We always try to work away from the natural condition of any pleasure to that in which it is least natural, least redolent of it Maker, and least pleasurable.  An ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing pleasure is the formula. (42)

A moderated religion is as good for us as no religion at all - and more amusing. (43)

[When your patient realizes] that his own faith is in direct opposition to the assumptions on which all the conversation of his new friends is based, . . . he will be silent when he ought to speak and laugh when he ought to be silent. . . .  All mortals tend to turn into the thing they are pretending to be. (46)

If prolonged, the habit of Flippancy builds up around a man the finest armor plating against the Enemy that I know, and it is quite free from the dangers inherent in the other sources of laughter.  It is a thousand miles away from joy; it deadens, instead of sharpening, the intellect;  and it excites no affection between those who practice it. (52)

The safest road to Hell is the gradual one - the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.  (56)

The deepest likings and impulses of any man are the raw material, the starting point, with which the Enemy  has furnished him. (59)

The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favor that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbor's talents - or in a sunrise, and elephant, or a waterfall. . . .  When they have really learned to love their neighbors as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbors. (64)

The truth is that wherever a man lies with a woman, there, whether they like it or not, a transcendental relation is set up which must be eternally enjoyed of eternally endured. (83)

Much of the modern resistance to chastity comes from men's belief that they "own" their bodies. . . .  They will find out in the end, never fear, to whom their time, their souls, and their bodies really belong - certain not to them, whatever happens.  (98)

Prosperity knits a man to the World, He feels that he is "finding his place in it," while really it is finding its place in him.  (132)

Nowhere do we tempt so successfully as on the very steps on the altar. (172) 

The work of spiritual warfare seems to be more tactics than force.  According to Lewis, we find ourselves more outmaneuvered by Satan than overpowered by him.  In the end, we are defeated by our own desires.  It is this end to which the Devil works.  "Get behind me Satan!  You are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of men!"

What sorts of things keep my mind from being set on God?  Forgetfulness brought on by keeping God on the outskirts of my life through "great" causes, diminishing pleasures, trust in God "moderated" into mere talk,  being of the World, holding onto my body as if I owned it, etc.  The options are endless and yet surprisingly repetitive.

If I were to sum up Screwtape's strategy, it would be to keep God out of the mind.  He talks of the many ways of using the flesh (natural human ability, status, and experience apart from God) and the World (organized, historically-moving, institutional flesh) to keep God out of the picture.  The gospel is intended to "renew the mind" for the transformation of my life.  The good news is that I do not have to forget or neglect God, but can live with his continual presence in my mind, and also in my life.  The kingdom that Jesus rules is the continual, eternal, working influence of God in each life and outward into all the universe.

Satan's tactics certainly do make for a strong assault.  Through lies and temptation, I am easily led to destruction.  Without God to lead me elsewhere, I will go astray.  Unlike Satan, God does not intend to control me, but to influence me deeply, fill me, work in and through me.  He is a loving Father always near, not a calculating tyrant, always coercing and manipulating.  Satan's main lie and temptation is simple: "You can't trust Jesus.  Trust yourself instead."

Lord, it is one thing to talk about Satan academically and another to face his lies and temptation in my life.  Let me continually set my mind on you.  Let me not listen to those lies, but only to your truth.  "May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer."  Amen.


The small temptations and sins lead to bigger ones.  The battles begin with arguments and skirmishes before they become all out war.  I cannot patrol the borders of my life alone.  The Lord is my shield and fortress and an ever-present help in trouble.

The Spirit of the Gospel is Good News

Devotional Classics, Francis of Assisi, Excerpts from The Little Flowers of St. Francis

"[God] wants you to go about the world preaching, because God did not call you for yourself alone but also for the salvation of others."  And then the hand of the Lord came over St. Francis.  As soon as he heard this answer and thereby knew the will of Christ, he got to his feet, all aflame with divine power and said to Brother Masseo with great fervor: "So let's go - in the name of the Lord!"

He preached so fervently that all the men and women of the village, as a result of his sermon and the miracle of the swallows, in their great devotion wanted to follow him and abandon the village.  But St. Francis did not let them, saying to them: "Don't be in a hurry and don't leave, for I will arrange what you should do for the salvation of your souls." (pp. 296-297)

How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” (Romans 10:14-15)

Sharing the message of salvation is at the heart of having faith in God.  What else could the desire of Christ be other than "God did not call you for yourself alone but also for the salvation of others."  The God who sent his Word to us as Jesus would have us withhold our own words from others.  The God who spoke to us out of love, joy, and peace would not have us be silent, but also have the love, joy, and peace of sharing his love and presence through the message of grace.

When such a great joy is made into a burden, I cannot but think of Jesus words to the Pharisees about how they search the world and make a convert twice the son of hell that they are themselves (Matthew 23).  What better way to silence the joy of the message than take the joy out of it?  And the peace and the love?  The gospel preached in such a spirit would drive people away and make disciples afraid to share it because of the such false gospels.

I think of people who go around telling people that God hates them and that they will go to hell.  No doubt God hates sin.  No doubt that hell is real.  But is this good news?  The gospel is a story of deliverance.  God has made a way for deliverance from our sins and hell.  Jesus shows us that there is a way to talk about sin and hell with great love and compassion.  Preaching and sharing the good news is much more than information, it is using the words to save and comfort and make whole rather than condemn, attack, and skewer people.  The spirit of the words is at least as important as the words themselves.

I love Francis' humility.  When people wanted to up and follow him, he told them to stay and not hurry.  The message of grace is not that we have to leave our places, but our ways.  We do not have to hurry to God, but remain with him as we find him.  We are tempted to follow the messenger rather than the message.  Francis saw this tendency and told the people to remain, knowing that, like Jacob, each person could say, "God is in this place and I did not know it!"

The gospel is simply the Good News.  How can I do anything but share?  The only way I might have trouble sharing is if this good news has somehow become bad or not "news."  Badness comes from how I and other people mistreat the message by making it mean.  It becomes boring old news when I fail to live and believe it, leaving it as a used and empty formula.

Lord, may I have the joy of Francis.  May I simply get up in response to your will and word and say, "Let's go!"  May I have the humility of Francis who saw that if the gospel must be lived where each person is to be real news and not old news.  Forgive me when I make the gospel anything but Good News.  Amen.


Sharing the gospel deepens joy in the gospel.  Living out the deliverance of God in my life keeps the gospel fresh.  The greatest deterrent to sharing is the bad news that masquerades as the gospel.  The life and reality of the gospel can only live through my own continual practice and  surrender to God saving me from my sins and former way of life.  It is the spirit of the gospel that makes it good and makes it real.  Mistreating the gospel makes it mean and boring.

The Gospel and Whole Life

Devotional Classics, Sadhu Sundar Singh, Excerpts from With and Without Christ

Where the tongue is lacking, life, through action, reveals the reality.  As St Paul says: "The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (2 Cor. 3:6, NIV) 

Almost everyone has an inner capacity - some more, some less - to sense spiritual truths without knowing how they have attuned them.  As someone has said: "They know without knowing how." 

The will to live, which is present in every person, is an impulse urging us to carry life to its perfection, that is, to that state in which the purpose of God for each life will be fulfilled, so that we will be eternally happy in Him.  On the other hand, to those who are without the experience of the joyful inner life in God, life is a burden. 

The inner life cannot be freed by changing the place or by killing the body, but only by putting off the "old person" and putting on the new person, thus passing from death to life. 

A scientist had a bird in his hand.  He saw that it had life, and, wanting to find out what part of the bird's body the life was, he began dissecting the bird.  The result was that the very life of which he was in search disappeared mysteriously.  Those who try to understand the inner life merely intellectually will meet with a similar failure.  The life for which they are looking will vanish in the analysis. 

In comparison with this big world, the human heart is only a small thing.  Though the world is so large, it is unable to satisfy this tiny heart.  Our ever growing soul and its capacities can only be satisfied in the infinite God. 

After fulfilling its purpose for some time as the instrument of the soul for its work in the world, the body begins to refuse, through weakness and old age, to go along with the spirit any further.  This is because the body cannot keep pace with the eternally growing soul. . . .  To die in the Lord does not mean death, for the Lord is "the Lord of the living and not the dead,"  but to die in the Lord means oneself in his work.

The same breath is blown into the flute, cornet, and bagpipe, but different music is produced according to the different instruments.  In the same way the one Spirit works in us, God's children, but different results are produced, and God is glorified through them according to each one's temperament and personality. (pp. 288-291)

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, full of grace and truth.  (John 1:14) 

One of the remarkable things about the gospel is that it speaks to my whole life.  It does not dominate my life like an oppressive religion would.  It does not control my life like cult would.  It does not remain in some strange little category like "my faith" or "my religious practice" would.  It influences and overflows into all parts of my life and changes them all by its truth and power.

Because of this all-encompassing nature, this good news defies complete explanation.  It is not irrational, but is so expansive that it cannot be contained by explanation.  In this way, the "tongue is lacking" and only life as a whole "reveals the reality."  In Christian terms, this is Incarnation, the Word made flesh.  Jesus himself is the only true Incarnation, but now has passed that on to his Body, the Church, in this present age.  Although imperfect in so many ways, the present Incarnation still reveals the reality through the life within it.

About this gospel, people "know without knowing" about its truth, so that it causes the reaction for or against Jesus as Lord.  Just as a baby has the reflex to grab what is placed in its hand, people start with the desire to survive.  Just as the reflex leaves the baby's hand as it grows and is replaced by conscious control, so the will to live grows in the light of the gospel as my purpose is realized and consciously sought after.  That purpose is Christ being all and in all, not as an undifferentiated pool of life, but as a family of kindred spirits seeking the goodness of God and his life together in manifold ways.

This life that the gospel gives is not located somewhere physically where it can be measured or identified.  Nor is it a life that can be explained fully by what is seen and experienced in this world, but transcends it as surely as my soul will outlast everything I see and only be satisfied with the infinite glory of God.  The life that the gospel creates will outlast and tire out this temporary body and only be contained in a glorified body made for the glorified spirit, which is one that is dead to everything but God's work and God's ways.  This life from the gospel can sound and look so different in the lives of so many people, but it is has the same breath and vitality that is unmistakably of the Spirit.

Such a message can only be communicated and retained by God himself as Father above, as the Son who teaches and mediates, and as the Spirit who guides and encourages.  Such a message brings about a life fully given to love, wanting what is good in God and for God and for other people.  Without a God who is with us and our lives fully engaged, the message remains lacking as just of the tongue or "merely intellectual."

Lord, Singh expresses a wholeness of the gospel that speaks to life as a whole.  I am encouraged and reminded of that message and how deeply each person needs to hear it and respond to it.  Let me put to death that "old person" so I can find life eternal and joyful with you.  Amen.


So easily does the gospel become a series of words or a list of deeds.  These are so limited and so deadening.  The gospel does not come from me, but surrounds and immerses me.  It is the invitation into the life and influence of God, his kingdom.  It is a new world and the age to come.  I need only talk about life and the gospel comes out since it touches everything.  Even in my disobedience, I show its rightness and necessity.  Only the death of denial can hide its light from myself and others.

The Word and Surrender

Devotional Classics, E. Stanley Jones, Excerpts from Conversation

Conversion is a gift and an achievement.  It is the act of a moment and the work of a lifetime.  You cannot attain salvation by disciplines - it is the gift of God.  But you cannot retain it without disciplines.  If you try to attain salvation by disciplines, you will be trying to discipline an unsurrendered self.  You will be sitting on a lid.  The result will be tenseness instead of trust.  "You will wrestle instead of nestle. . . ."  Discipline is the fruit of conversion - not the root. . . .  So we take and try; we obtain and attain.

[Jesus] did three things by habit: (1) "He stood up to read as was his custom" - he read the Word of God by habit.  (2) "He went out into the mountain to pray as was his custom" - he prayed by habit.  (3) "He taught them again as was his custom" - he passed on to others by habit what he had and what he had found. . . .  No converted person can live without those habits at work vitally in his life.

I know two brilliant Christians who come to the daily morning devotions without their Bibles.  They can meditate, they say.  They are both shallow.  For they mediate God to themselves through their own thinking - they become the medium.  They do not go to God direct as they imagine - they go through their own thinking; they become the mediator.

Dr. Howard Atwood Kelley. . . says of reading the Bible, "The Bible vindicates itself because it is such excellent medicine.  It has never failed to cure a single patient if only he took his prescription honestly."  Take the prescription of the Word of God daily.  No Christian is sound who is not scriptural.

When prayer fades out, power fades out.  We are as spiritual as we are prayerful; no more, no less.

It is a law of the mind that that which is not expressed dies.  If you don't share it, you won't have it.

The rule about confessing your sins should be, the circle of confession should be the circle affected by the sin.

Pray for those who have wronged you.  That will be an antidote for resentment and bitterness.  A theological professor keeps a car index of nasty letters he receives and prays for their writers every day.  No wonder his spirit has an extraordinary sweetness.  (pp. 281-285)

In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning.  (John1:1-2)

There are quite a few ways in which I do not take my Bible prescription "honestly."  Jones points some of the big ones out well.  First, I try to read my Bible before I am surrendered to God, before I am converted in some part of my life.  Whatever I might hope to gain from Bible reading will only come when I am submitted to God and the good that he wants rather than my own agendas.

I must surrender my desires not because they are always bad, but because they are meant to align with God and his desires.  Without that surrender, my Bible reading tends to serve rationalizations of my own desires and feelings.  I do not see what God wants to show me, but only what I want to see.  Such reading feeds inner arguments, justifies whatever I happen to be doing, and quenches the love from the Spirit for God and other people.

Insight from the Bible, like conversion itself, is a gift of God.  It cannot be attained through raw effort, but must first be granted in grace.  Effort comes after the gift because effort must work with the gift.  Without that I will be "tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming" - starting with myself!  (Ephesians 4:14)  However, without discipline, the gift of the Spirit's illumination will not be retained.

One of the best ways to submit myself to God through the Bible is to develop a habit of reading and study.  Without the habit, I quickly drift off into the reiteration of my own thoughts and feelings which, like manna, are sufficient for one day, but often will not meet the needs of the next.  Also, I am tempted to try to achieve a feeling instead of understanding.  Bursts of understanding bring pleasure, but by habit I do not allow such pleasures to guide my reading and study, but rather a continued choice to seek God through the Bible, whether pleasant or not, "deep" or not, or inspiring or not.

Another way to surrender is to bathe my readings and study in prayer.  Asking and praising, talking and thinking with God must be habitual as well.  Without such prayer, the whole thing of Bible study becomes a bunch of unrelated thoughts that are guided by my worries and lusts rather than my trust and worship.  What I read or study in the Bible needs to be preceded by immersion in God's presence.  What I find and enjoy in the Bible also needs to lead me into prayers of confession, thanksgiving, praise, and quiet.

Finally, reading the Bible leads to teaching and evangelism.  I like Jones' expression that "it is a law of the mind that that which is not expressed dies."  Evangelism is built into devotion to God and the Bible.  "We cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard" the apostles said before the Sanhedrin when told not to speak about Jesus or in his name.  I find this is in contrast to what I have often thought evangelism is.  It is telling what I have seen and heard rather than telling other people what I think they need to know.  It is shared discovery rather than making converts.

In explaining what I have seen and heard through a prayerful reading of the Bible deepens my surrender to God.  I find that although the Bible is right, I can be wrong.  Even though I hear God, I may not always understand what he means.  This calls for walking with God moment by moment, instead of trying to get a kind of knowledge that I can use on my own.  Relying on God to reveal his thoughts through the Bible is helped by receiving it as a gift, making it a habit, bathing it in prayer, and seeking ways to share what I have discovered.

Lord, you sent the Word to us.  You did not keep it to yourself, but because of the love and joy in you, your sent your message, Jesus.  The Bible speaks faithfully of that Word and in many ways it is that Word to me.  Help me to receive it as a gift wit humility and expectation.  Amen.


One way I am learning to submit to God's word is to handle it carefully, physically as well as spiritually.  By bowing my head or holding the Bible in my hands a certain way, I can be reminded of the great truth it contains and the great God it brings me to.

Compassion Is Not Mostly About Feeling Good

Devotional Classics, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Excerpts from Life Together

Christianity means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ.  No Christian community is more of less than this.

[A Christian] needs his brother solely because of Jesus Christ.  The Christ in his own heart is weaker than the Christ in the word of his brother; his own heart is uncertain, his brother's is sure.  And that also clarifies the goal of all Christian community: they meet one another as bringers of the message of salvation.

Without Christ we should not know God, we could not call upon him, nor come to him.  But without Christ we also could not know our brother, nor could we come to him.  The way is blocked by our own ego.

If, before we could know and wish it, we have been chosen and accepted with the whole Church in Jesus Christ, then we also belong to him in eternity with one another.  We who live here in fellowship with him will one day be with him in eternal fellowship.

The more we received, the more we were able to give; and the more meager our brotherly love, the less were we living by God's mercy and love.

Not what a man is in himself as a Christian, his spirituality and piety, constitutes the basis of our community.  What determines our brotherhood is what that man is by reason of Christ.  Our community with one another consists solely in what Christ has done to both of us. . . .  The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is vital between us.

This dismisses the clamorous desire for something more.  One who wants more than what Christ has established does not want Christian brotherhood.  He is looking for some extraordinary social experience which he has not found elsewhere; he is bringing muddled and impure desires into Christian brotherhood.  Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate.  (pp.271-275)

He is our peace. (Ephesians 2:14)

Because of the worship of feeling and desire that I have been exposed to for so long, I am frequently pushed by that "clamorous desire for something more."  It comes into just about every area of my life and brings dissatisfaction and worry in its path.  It eats away at love, joy, and peace.  It continually draws my attention to my pride and my "stomach."

This is no less true as I think about worship services.  Rather than enjoying the peace that Christ has brought and looking for his words and his face in the people I worship with, I am often worried about "looking for some extraordinary experience" or simply embracing indifference to worship and fellowship.  I have been known to say "It doesn't matter" about Christian fellowship from disappointment and even bitterness.

Neither indifference nor the worship of feeling and desire will cross the bridge of fellowship with other disciples.  One dismisses a primary means of God's goodness and grace: other believers.  The other dismisses the reason we gather: seeing Christ and him alone.  Our relationships and fellowship are subordinate to this one good, this hope, this desire: "Jesus Christ and his work [as] the one and only thing that is vital between us."

Yesterday, I aspired to enter the reality of that fellowship rather than trying to create an ideal of what I think fellowship should be.  I sought to pray for others and enjoy what they brought and most of all look for what God was trying to do in our time together.  I spent most of my time inviting God to join us and bathe us in his presence, since nothing we do in itself with bring about the change, the desire, the love, nor the peace that we need.  The songs, the words, the prayers are all empty without our being immersed in God's presence.

And so it also is with compassion.  I find I am easily pulled into thinking that compassion is a lot about what makes me feel good and useful.  I use it as a means of self-satisfaction, so that I can push away a number of unpleasant emotions, like guilt or empathy.  Compassion is not about having an "extraordinary experience."

Like worship, compassion cannot bring me closer to others in itself.  It too needs to be bathed in God's working presence.  Only then can it become what it needs to be for me and others I may help: both a "message of salvation" and a "reality in which we may participate."

Lord, deliver me from compassion that seeks to be a "powerful experience" or the tie that binds me to others.  It is a means for your grace.  It is a place where I may meet you and others who love you.  Let me not overvalue or demean this work, Father.  Amen.


I want this to be a constant reminder to me: "the more we received, the more we were able to give."  A lack of compassion is a lack of reception of God and his work in myself and in others.  I see that with service, I need not only to draw close to him myself, but invite his presence into each situation to do as he wills.

Compassion and Hospitality

Devotional Classics, Catherine of Siena, Excerpts from The Dialogue

At the first stair, lifting the feet of her affections from the earth, [the soul] stripped herself of sin.  At the second she dressed herself in love for virtue.  And at the third stage she tasted peace.

In fact, his divinity is kneaded in the clay of your humanity like one bread.

For he proved his unspeakable love, and the human heart is always drawn by love. . . .  You can hardly resist being drawn by love, unless you foolishly refuse to be drawn.

All virtue draws life from him, nor is there any virtue that has not been tested in him.  So no one can have any life-giving virtue but from him, that is, by following his example and his teaching.

The hostelry [lodging] of holy Church is there to serve the bread of life and blood lest the journeying pilgrims, my creatures, grow weary and faint on the way.

When he says that he is the Way, he is speaking the truth. . . .  He says he is the Truth, and so he is, and whoever follows him goes the way of truth.  And he is Life.  If you follow his truth, you will have the life of grace and never die of hunger, for the Word has himself become your food.

 Although the images seem scattered as I read some pieces from The Dialogue, I am touched by the "earthiness" of her descriptions.  Bread comes up a lot.  Christ himself is like divinity kneaded into the dough of humanity.  The Church is viewed as a lodging where people might come to eat.  Life itself is given through bread, so that none of us will starve.

In all these things, Christ is himself the bread of life.  His deity is what leavens and raises his humanity.  It is perfectly kneaded into a human life and also into all human life through his Spirit.  Our existence need not be flat and hard, but can be light and full of flavor in his presence.

His love draws us into life.  The only way to escape is to refuse.  For life, he gives himself as our sustenance, our bread, our food.  He is the Life in that he keeps us alive through his continued love and grace and wisdom being taken and "eaten" by us.  He grants life; we need only consume what he gives.

He left a place where such feasting happens.  Some hospitality is better than others, but Jesus gives us rest and food when we gather and abide together.  The church is such a place.  There is no other public place that honors Christ directly and gathers in order to worship and serve him.  This is the lodging where we can stay and rest on our journeys.

Compassion is not much else than hospitality:  a welcome, a meal, and a place to rest.  Jesus is all of these things.  Bread, lodging, and other parts of hospitality are the reflections.

Lord, may my hands be full of your goodness so that I might offer hospitality.  May I offer a loving welcome that draws others in, a meal of bread that satisfies the soul, and a lodging where the rest of kindness lives.  In all these things may I reflect you, our true Host and Friend.  Amen.

Compassion suffers when it loses intimacy.  I cannot offer such hospitality at all times, but I would love to find ways of showing compassion in a more intimate, personal way, so that people leave with more than a full belly or a rested body: a comforted soul.