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9

DON’T CHANGE, GROW

  The rain falls on the dry earth and makes it blossom. It comes because it is needed. It does not wait for the earth to change. During Advent we pray that the heavens may open and that the Lord may come upon us like spring rain. This he does, coming to us as we are, not waiting for us to change. Indeed, he does not even come to change us. It may seem strange to say that God does not come to change us. But when you think of it, true love must be like that. In a way it’s obvious. If I say to you, ‘I love you and I want to change you to be better or different’, this is a contradiction. It means, in fact, that I do not love you. I love some image of you, some other version of you which I have created. If I desire to change somebody, I do not really love that person. If you accept someone on condition that they change, that they be different, then in fact you are not accepting them. The only real love is unconditional love, which is God’s kind of loving.

  In saying we should not try to change people, we are not saying that we must pretend there is no evil in the person. There is evil in every person, evil in me, evil in you. Eyes of love will not be blind to the evil, but they will see much more. Love will see past the evil to the real you. Love will not identify you with the evil in you. In the presence of love, which is also truth, you and I will not be led into any hypocrisy or pretence about evil. I believe that there will remain a real sense of the existence of evil. Indeed, I believe there will be an even sharper awareness of that evil in the presence of true love, but simultaneously there will be an awareness of something greater, something overwhelmingly greater which robs the awareness of evil of its sting, of its power to demolish me. I will realise that the love is greater, that I am still totally accepted, even as I am. A healing takes place in that moment. This helps me to understand the saints. They had both these insights at the same moment, an acute awareness of sin and a joyful certainty of loving acceptance. This resulted for many of them in tears, the tears of Magdalen. These are tears not of sadness but of great wonder and joy.

  Jesus loves in this way. Isn’t it wonderful that Jesus, the only one who has a right to put a condition on love, puts none? Jesus, the only one qualified to judge, does not judge? Jesus, the only one free from co-operation with evil, does not let his eyes stay on our evil, but goes past it to the good of our deepest selves! In the gospel story it was Simon the Pharisee who was saying to himself, ‘If this man were a prophet, he would know who this woman is that is touching him and what a bad name she has’ (Luke 7:39). Simon is so conscious of Magdalen’s sins he can see nothing else. It is Jesus who is aware of her love. Have you noticed that in the story of the prodigal son it is only the elder brother who speaks about the evil in his young brother? It is he who rants about the disgrace, the waste of money, the prostitution. The father makes no mention of the young lad’s failure. The father is love. Notice also that when the father runs down the road to welcome the young son, he embraced him in his rags of sin. He did not wait for the boy to have a shower and change into the best robe!

  God can cope with us exactly as we are. Maybe it’s because he alone sees us exactly as we are. Looking at us with eyes of love he sees more than we see. ‘God does not see as man sees; man looks at appearances but Yahweh looks at the heart.’ (1 Samuel 16:7) We judge ourselves and each other. God does not. God simply loves. And he loves us with his whole heart and being; as he has asked us to love. This love of his does not grow. It cannot, because he loves with his whole heart. I will never be more acceptable to God than I am right now, whether I am in the depth of sin or the height of sanctity. His love will not grow. All that can grow is my awareness of the mystery of that love. It is when I accept that mystery that, hopefully, my love for him may start to grow. Here is a lovely word from Charles de Foucauld. ‘To love anyone is to hope in him for always. From the moment at which we begin to judge anyone, to limit our confidence in him, from the moment at which we identify him with what we know of him and so reduce him to that, we cease to love him and he ceases to be able to be better.’ Jesus would say Amen to that.

  God comes to us in Jesus because he sees our beauty which, unfortunately, is often hidden and obscured by sin and evil. He comes to reveal that beauty. He wants to help us dig in the field of our lives and uncover the treasure buried there. He knows that if we glimpse that treasure, then we might be ready to sell all to keep it. Our deep, hidden selves, made in God’s image, are treasure that all the money in the world could not buy. One day Jesus was teaching those simple, humble, broken people who flocked to hear him. He put a question to them: ‘What, then, will a man gain if he wins the whole world and ruins his life? Or what has a man to offer in exchange for his life?’ (Matthew 16:26) I always used to read these words as a kind of warning, as if Jesus were saying, ‘Don’t risk hell for all the money in the world; don’t sell your soul for pleasure or money and risk exchanging heaven for hell, that would be a bad bargain.’ This meaning is still there, but I now find other rich meaning in these words. Jesus is asking us to see the wonder and mystery of our own beings. He wants us to reflect on our own beauty, value, worth. So he is asking these people whom he loves, ‘What would you exchange for your own self? What value do you put on yourself? Do you think the wealth of the whole world would be enough to buy you?’ We can imagine Jesus looking around at the faces of those listeners. He speaks with such sincerity and power. ‘If you put yourself in one scale of the balance and put all the riches of the world in the other scale, then the balance will tip in your favour. You are worth more than the world and if you sold yourself even for the whole world, it would be a bad bargain.’ And the listeners knew he meant it and they knew it was true.

   Jesus says the same to you and me now. He comes to reveal my own inmost self, the deeper beauty, the hidden treasure. It is when I listen and believe and agree with what he tells me about myself that I begin to live and grow. Jesus does not come to change me but to invite me to grow. This growth happens when I accept his love for me as I am. He invites me to become more and more my true self. I cannot grow and become myself until I first accept myself with his acceptance of me. Paul says if our hidden self is to grow it must be ‘planted in love’ (Ephesians 3:17).

  Notice that I reject the world ‘change’ and choose the word ‘grow’. Change can suggest becoming someone else. Growth suggests plan, direction. We say a seed ‘grows’. We do not say it ‘changes’, even though a fantastic change takes place. The seed grows and brings forth all the wonder of the shape, design, colour and perfume of the flower that is already hidden within it. All this beauty is already there potentially and the gardener ‘sees’ it because he looks with loving eyes. Jesus says in one parable, ‘My Father is the gardener’ (John 15:1)

  So when Jesus met the sinners, he did not scold or lecture them about sin. He did not even make them aware of their sin. Most of them were already depressingly aware of their sins. He moved with them in genuine acceptance and this friendship touched new springs of growth. And when he rose from the dead, he remained the same compassionate, understanding friend. When he came back to his friends after the Resurrection, we can imagine how miserable and ashamed they must have been, yet we do not find any sense of guilt, but rather total joy and deep peace. Why? Because Jesus took them as he found them. His love always gives what we need, not what we deserve. These friends needed encouragement and healing. So there was no scolding. He did not ask them where were they last Friday! Indeed he made no reference to his terrible ordeal, the kind of thing we would to arouse guilt in a friend who had let us down. It is the same Risen Lord who comes to us now, accepting us as he finds us.

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