Today’s readings: Click on today’s date at http://www.usccb.org/bible/
Honey in the honeycomb
Monday, March 9, 2015
Monday of the Third Week of Lent
2 Kings 5:1-15
Valiant as he was, Syrian army commander Naaman was a leper. Hoping for healing, he set out for Israel, taking along ten silver talents, six thousand gold pieces, and ten festal garments … While he stood at the door of Elisha’s house, the prophet sent him the message: “Go and wash seven times in the Jordan” … His flesh became again like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.
Nomads carry little and live off the desert land. Naaman was no nomad; he carried riches of all kinds with him, along with servants and food for all of them. He must have been quite a sight, especially to the unveiled eyes of Elisha.
Elisha does not come out to him. He sends him a message which Naaman rejects at first. So simple, so superstitious, so impersonal … and so humbling. To his credit, Naaman listens to the wisdom of his servants. Just do it, sir. Go and wash.
In my own experiences with eczema, which is at least a little like leprosy, I can get to the point where I don’t care about anything except my own skin. Nothing else matters, no one else matters … just the itch matters. I can’t think about anything else. Prayer, at least the controlled prayer that I pray for others when they are sick, is impossible. All I can do is scream, or cry, or groan, or sigh. The Jesus Prayer is the best I can do (and the Jesus Prayer is really terrific).
Naaman too was desperate. Thomas Merton writes about the “virgin point, la pointe vierge,” a core place inside each of us where we reside only with God. Nothing can invade or penetrate that place.
My friend with completely unexpected cancer, my friend whose adult daughter rejects him and withholds his grand children because she believes false memories from her childhood, my friend who lost his wife but is convinced he should have been the first to go … they know what it means to be homeless.
But these men and women have taken many deep breaths and spent time IN their pain when they could avoid it no longer. Sometimes gradually, sometimes in a rush of insight, they have each found the only home they will always have, home deep inside, home that is stable and eternal. This is the place all of us will find one day. Soon and very soon. Come, Lord Jesus.
Our homelessness is not immediately apparent. But things change, and we are undone. Our diminishment does not fade and disappear. We are not in charge anymore and won’t be again. It is then, in spite of embarrassment and shame, that we head down to the river seven days in a row and bathe in the water. Oh, the water.
You live within me, and you pour living water over me, Lord. In the silence of the night watch and the dawn of each new day, may the words of my mouth and meditations of my heart be acceptable. In your sight. O Lord.
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