Speaking of the Lord’s command to us to “Be ye perfect,” C. S. Lewis gives us two wonderful analogies that help us see into the Lord’s determined heart. He says:

“Some people seem to think this means ‘Unless you are perfect, I will not help you’….But I do not think He meant that. I think He meant ‘The only help I will give is help to become perfect. You may want something less; but I will give you nothing less.’

“Let me explain. When I was a child I often had a toothache, and I knew that if I went to my mother she would give me something which would deaden the pain for that night and let me get to sleep. But I did not go to my mother—at least, not till the pain became very bad. And the reason I did not go was this. I did not doubt she would give me the aspirin; but I knew she would also do something else. I knew she would take me to the dentist the next morning. I could not get what I wanted out of her without getting something more, which I did not want. I wanted immediate relief from the pain: but I could not get it without having my teeth set permanently right. And I knew those dentists; I knew they started fiddling about with all sorts of other teeth which had not yet begun to ache. They would not let sleeping dogs lie….

“Now, if I may put it that way, our Lord is like the dentists….Dozens of people go to Him to be cured of some one particular sin which they are ashamed of….Well, He will cure it all right; but He will not stop there. That may be all you asked; but if once you call Him in, He will give you the full treatment….

“The job will not be completed in this life; but He means to get us as far as possible before death….

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of—throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace.  He intends to come and live in it Himself.

“The command Be ye perfect is not…a command to do the impossible. He is going to make us into creatures that can obey that command. He said (in the Bible) that we were ‘gods’ and He is going to make good His words. If we let Him—for we can prevent Him, if we choose—He will make the feeblest and filthiest of us into a god or goddess, dazzling, radiant, immortal creature, pulsating all through with such energy and joy and wisdom and love as we cannot now imagine….The process will be long and in parts very painful; but that is what we are in for. Nothing less. He meant what He said.” 

(C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1960, pp. 171-75.)

The Old Fisherman
(by Mary Bartels Bray)

“For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger and ye took me in.
“Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”

Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to outpatients at the clinic.

One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to see a truly awful looking man. “Why, he’s hardly taller than my eight-year-old,” I thought as I stared at the stooped, shriveled body. But the appalling thing was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw. Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, “Good evening. I’ve come to see if you’ve a room for just one night. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no bus till morning.”

He told me he’d been hunting for a room since noon but with no success. No one seemed to have a room. “I guess it’s my face. I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more treatments…”

For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me. “I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning.”

I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch. I went inside and finished getting supper prepared. When we were ready, I asked the old man if he would join us. “No thank you. I have plenty.” And he held up a brown paper bag.

When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk with him for a few minutes. It didn’t take long time to see that this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body. He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her five children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from a back injury.

He didn’t tell it by way of complaint. In fact, every other sentence was prefaced with a “thanks to God” for a blessing. He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him the strength to keep going.

At bedtime, my husband set up a camp cot in the children’s room for him. When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded and the little man was out on the porch. He refused breakfast. But just before he left for his bus, haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said, “Could I please come back and stay the next time I have a treatment? I won’t put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a chair.”

He paused a moment and then added, “Your children made me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children don’t seem to mind.”

I told him he was welcome to come again.

On his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the largest oysters I had ever seen. He said he had shucked them that morning before he left so that they’d be nice and fresh. I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m. and I wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.

During the years he came to stay overnight with us, there was never a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables from his garden. Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special delivery; fish and oysters packed in a box with fresh young spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed. Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these, and knowing how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.

When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first morning. “Did you keep that awful looking man last night? I turned him away! You can lose customers by putting up such people!”

Maybe we did lose customers once or twice. But oh! If only they could have known him, perhaps their own illnesses would have been easier to bear. I know our family will always be grateful to have known him. From him, we learned what it was to accept the bad without complaint and the good with gratitude to God.

Recently I was visiting a friend who has a greenhouse. As she showed me her flowers, we came to the most beautiful one of all—a golden chrysanthemum, bursting with blooms. But to my great surprise, it was growing in an old dented, rusty bucket.

I thought to myself, “If this were my plant, I’d put it in the loveliest container I had!” My friend changed my mind.

“I ran short of pots,” she explained,” and knowing how beautiful this one would be, I thought it wouldn’t mind starting out in this old pail. It’s just for a little while, until I can put it out in the garden.”

She must have wondered why I laughed so delightedly, but I was imagining just such a scene in heaven. “Here’s an especially beautiful one,” God might have said when he came to the soul of the sweet old fisherman. “He won’t mind starting in this small, misshapen body.”

But that was long ago—and now, in God’s garden, how tall this lovely soul must stand.

For I was afraid and ye gave me peace. I was blind and ye led the way. My body was in prison and ye understood. I was slower than others, but ye waited for me. I was discouraged and ye brought me cheer. I was limited, but ye understood the message of my heart.

“Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”

(Adapted, Guideposts, June 1965, pp. 24-25.)

“It is only from the light which streams constantly from heaven that a tree can derive the energy to strike its roots deep into the soil. The tree is in fact rooted in the sky.” (Simone Weil)

I love this!

Now, we must agree that a tree is “rooted” in two places, for while it extracts its energy from the light of the sun, it also sends its roots deep into the earth to gather the water it needs to survive and grow. However, for me, this is a valuable reminder that we humans are truly dual beings. Our spirit-selves can’t get nourishment, except from heaven. This soul-food is found nowhere else. Meanwhile, our temporal bodies must get their nourishment from the world around us.

And although our bodies are extremely valuable, I think it’s important to remember, that it’s our spirits, not our bodies, who are the real us. Think of it…we were the real us long before we ever got into our bodies. These magnificent mortal bodies are temporary tools for learning and growth (though Christ has promised to give them back to us, perfected, in the resurrection). However, our spirits, though they have amnesia, are largely unchanged since coming here. They longingly seek the peace and beauty of their eternal home. So, while our spirits long for heaven, our bodies are clinging to the world around us. Aha! Is it any wonder that we often find ourselves greatly at war with ourselves? And if we’re careless, we can get so attached to the physical world that our spirit-selves become numb and in danger of ignoring—or even rejecting—the true Light of the world that is continually being offered to us.

To the Jews who didn’t believe in Him, Jesus said: “Ye are of this world; I am not of this world” (John 8: 23). These souls were overly-attached down here, and were not “rooted in the sky.” (They missed the Light of the world when it was blazing right in front of them!)

As well, Jesus’ prophets have counseled us for years the need to be ‘in the world, but not of the world.’

So, we are here, and our bodies need what they need. But remember, they’re just clothing for the real us. And the real us also needs what it needs.

Therefore, I ask you, what are you “rooted in”, or connected to? From whence do you get your nourishment, your desire, your motivation, your power?

I want to send my roots upward, deep into heaven…so that I’ll have the spiritual nourishment and energy to reach deeply into the world, and connect with more and more individuals, and bring soul-nourishment to them. Jesus is the Vine. We are the branches. Try cutting off a branch and see how well it grows or how much fruit it bears. It doesn’t take long at all before it starts to shrivel and dry up. Jesus knew that our spirits needed Him, or they would go limp. He also knew He needed His Father. He was and is forever rooted in the sky. And we can be too, if we stay rooted in Him.

I want to live my life rooted in the sky! How about you?

Until next week… :)