My friend Miles sent me a letter about what happens when you run out of answers. I read it twice. The first time, I heard the lion roar. The second time, I heard what came after.
Miles describes a dying lion spending its last strength trying to control what happens next. I recognized that lion. I’ve spent whole afternoons rehearsing a conversation that already happened, making my points better each time. By supper I’d won the argument six different ways. The other person had gone on with their day.
Then Miles asks a question I can take with me into mine.
What is my part?
To love
I wish he’d given me something more complicated. I’m good at complicated. I can spend a week figuring out what everybody ought to do. Listening to somebody finish a sentence when I’m sure I know where it’s going can be a considerably bigger job.
That’s where surrender gets practical for me. I can admit I was sharp with somebody and ask their forgiveness without adding a closing argument. I can pray for someone when there’s nothing left for me to say to them. I can listen long enough to find out what the person in front of me actually needs.
Paul says we see through a glass darkly. I’ve always loved that line. It leaves room for the possibility that the story I’ve been telling myself about somebody is missing half the story. And a few verses earlier, Paul says charity is kind. I can work on that part today, even with the glass as dark as it is.
Miles ends with the possibility of peace. I keep thinking about that word possible. Faith gives me somewhere to turn when I’ve reached the end of what I can fix. Love gives me something to do in the next ordinary minute.
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.
1 Corinthians 13:13 (KJV)
