Saturday
after the Epiphany
January 11, 2014 8:30am
John the Baptist comments on his
relationship to Jesus.
He says, “He must increase; I must decrease.”
We need to voice the same words.
For us, this means that we allow
Jesus, little by little, to touch all that we are.
It means that we set out each
morning to allow him to affect what we say and how we say it, and what we do
and don’t do.
It even means that we allow even
the spirit of Jesus to affect our inner spirit – our attitudes, our
perspectives on life and persons and problems, whether these are personal to us
or societal.
“He must increase; I must decrease” – this also affects us in other
ways.
It means that I don’t always have
to talk about what I have done.
It means that I can be happy in
what others have done and accomplished too.
It means that I can listen when
others speak – listening to try to understand what they are saying and
thinking, and even trying to grasp what they are feeling underneath their
words.
It means that I do not interrupt others
when they are speaking and am not just waiting for a split-second break to say
what I am thinking about.
It means that I can be the center
of attention when that is appropriate.
And it means that I can
peacefully allow another to be the center also.
So, “He must increase; I must decrease” – these are challenging words
from John this morning.
Frankly, they go against a lot of
our cultural or societal ways of constant self-assertion and avoiding
self-effacement at all costs.
But, these words are the way of a
follower of Jesus.
They constitute sound spiritual
and therefore personal direction for us.
