| | *thinkingSociety rejects the handicapped, poor, elderly, and helpless because we see in them a clear reflection of the condition of our souls. Naked. Weak. Discomfiting. Pride serves as a feeble covering for our inadequacy. What does it matter when the emperor wears no clothes if everyone says he is robed in splendor?
Pity, too, cloaks identification. If you feel sorry for someone, it is from the tower of self-confidence, not the depth of understanding. The poor remind us that we all are hungry, inadequate, empty. In their hollow eyes, we see our mirror image, so we look away, and walk quickly by.
You
say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But
you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and
naked. I counsel you to
buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white
clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to
put on your eyes, so you can see. Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent. (Revelations 3:17-19, NIV)
We will always be weak. Humans versus nature, sin, heaven, hell? Please. Yet we still scramble to rebuild the facade each time it crumbles under its unsupported weight. It is so much more comforting, more genteel, to play a giant game of make-believe.
Accomplishment, talent, do not contribute to our worth. They serve as a mortal currency to value an immortal soul. We are precious because we are made in God's image, not for how we can perform. Without God's scale of importance, we are slaves to our own; chained to a cruel taskmaster of our own creation.
When we face our own failure, we can choose—choose to bury it under layers of fashionable clothing, a devil-may-care attitude, cars, houses, a trophy wife, brilliant children, burning intellect; or we can be honest, admit our natural inadequacy, and bring it to the One who turns fools to gold.
Hidden pain only festers and deforms. Opened pain dissolves into beauty through grace.
|
| | Posted 1/2/2007 12:16 PM - 5 comments
- recommend
  - recs0
- give stars
- votes0
- email
 - sent0
|
