The dark of night

After some thought, and good counsel from a couple wise friends, I think I've got a better line on blogging.

Don't think it can be journaling, per se--too personal. Don't think it can be editorializing--not personal enough.

Not my inner monologue (at least mostly not)--we've all seen that now. Even if you all don't mind it, I find it quiet unsettling to see my brain poured out messily onto the paper like that.

Just needs to be things that I think about things.

Yup.

So you all know that I think about things.. so it's only a matter of time until I begin taking the time and making the effort required to really write about something that's maybe worth writing about. (as opposed to writing about writing--which has now grown horribly old)

Here's a little morsel of the type of thing that I'm talking about. Not up for fleshing it out, but...

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I have this little book called "Something Beautiful for God." It was written by Malcolm Muggeridge about his experiences with Mother Teresa.

(I was introduced to Muggeridge--British journalist and gadfly--via Ravi Zacharias--Indian Christian theologian--via, I believe, the Chuck Swindol radio ministry. Weird how the world works, huh?)

One of the points that Muggeridge brings out (oh, so skillfully!) about the lady is her attitude toward the poor and dying with whom she and her sisters work.

They do not pity them.

Anyone can pity, Mother Teresa claims simply. The thing that keeps the work from being merely social work is the love... the love that they show to their Jesus in, as she constantly refers to it, "His distressing disguise." They don't care for the poor and dying because of Jesus--they care for them because they are Jesus.

How novel is this, to see each person as Jesus? Not to see them as some kind of representative figure.. not to see them as a challenge.. "as much as you have done... so have you done to me".. Okay, Lord! We'll feed, clothe and visit, but we want it on the record! We did this to them, so we did it to you, so it counts! We get in!

No. Each one of these people *is* Jesus. Every single one of them. And in order for Jesus to do His work on this earth--even if "His work" somehow equals nothing more than dying quietly in the cool peace of the sisters' grotto, surrounded by hands of compassion.. hands that love Him, despite His squallor and stench and humiliation.. His untouchability--it is necessary that He not be pitied. It is necessary for Him to be valued. In recognizing His value, they somehow cause His work to be complete.

What a good book. What a challenge. What a humbling portrait of love.

What do I take away from it? Kudos to Muggeridge and Mother Teresa--I just want to do Something Beautiful for God.
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