John 3:30–31
He must become greater; I must become less.
“The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from
the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who
comes from heaven is above all.
For it is not so much of our time and so much
of our attention that God demands; it is not even all our time and all our
attention; it is our-selves. For each of us the Baptist’s words are true:
“HE
MUST INCREASE AND I DECREASE.”
He will be infinitely merciful to our repeated
failures; I know no promise that He will accept a deliberate compromise. For He
has, in the last resort, nothing to give us but Himself; and He can give that
only insofar as our self-affirming will retires and makes room for Him in our
souls. Let us make up our minds to it; there will be nothing “of our own” left
over to live on, no “ordinary” life. I do not mean that each of us will
necessarily be called to be a martyr or even an ascetic. That’s as may be. For
some (nobody knows which) the Christian life will include much leisure, many
occupations we naturally like. But these will be received from God’s hands. In
a perfect Christian they would be as much part of his “religion,” his
“service,” as his hardest duties, and his feasts would be as Christian as his
fasts. What cannot be admitted—what must exist only as an undefeated but daily
resisted enemy—is the idea of something that is “our own,” some area in which
we are to be “out of school,” on which God has no claim.
For He claims all, because He is love and must
bless. He cannot bless us unless He has us. When we try to keep within us an
area that is our own, we try to keep an area of death. Therefore, in love, He
claims all. There’s no bargaining with Him.
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