3 Nephi 17-19

At the beginning of chapter 17, Jesus tells the people that it's time for him to leave them: "my time is at hand" (17:1). But then he looks around, and he sees that "they were in tears, and did look steadfastly upon him as if they would ask him to tarry a little longer with them" (v.5). Then his own "bowels are filled with compassion" (v. 6)—which I take to mean that he was seized with a visceral love for them (a feeling I first experienced, apart from my childhood feelings for my parents, as a missionary). And so he changes his plans, postpones his departure, stays a while longer. He wants to be with them, just as they want to be with him. They desire each other's company. They like each other, which is actually a horribly understated way to put it but has the virtue of being very concrete. "Christ loves us" is a facile thing to say, and it's said so often that it can easily become bereft of any real emotional texture. It's quite a different matter to say: Christ likes being with us so much that when it was time for him to leave, he stopped at the door and turned around and said, "Oh what the hey, the Father and the lost tribes can wait! I'm staying a little longer!"

And then it turns out that the people Jesus is most interested in spending more time with are the sick, the disabled, and the children—which is to say, the people who are most likely to be on the margins. As I write that sentence, I suddenly have the uncomfortable awareness that one could this read as being like a politician's photo-op: okay, Senator, let's put in an appearance in the cancer ward; let's go kiss some babies. But of course, I assume that what I'm meant to take from this is that Jesus reaches out to the sick and the disabled and the children because he wants to be with them; he likes being with them; he enjoys their company as much as anyone else's. By contrast, I'm don't particularly look forward to being with sick or disabled people (it's awkward) nor with children (they're trying). I can do it—I've been a medical interpreter; I have disabled relatives; I've been told I'm actually pretty good with kids. But my bowels are not filled with the kind of compassion that would make me want to be in the company of a sick person, a disabled person, or a child so much that I would turn around at the door as I was about to leave and say, "Oh what the hey, I'm going to stay a little longer!" It hasn't happened yet, anyway.

Well... wait. I feel like I'm being too flippantly self-deprecating here. Okay. I feel moved to say the following. And let me preface it quickly by saying that this is not where I planned to go with today's reflection: I thought this post was going to be more theologically minded, a reflection on the sacrament and prayer as ways that Jesus manages to go on being with us and ways that we reach out to be with him. But let me follow instead where the Spirit seems to be wanting to take me.

It's not true that I haven't been in situations where I reached out in compassion to someone who was sick. Example: I was once on the phone with someone who had recently been diagnosed with cancer (I don't remember now if I knew that when I was talking with this person, or if I found that out later). And as we were talking about something else entirely—I did not really know this person, we had never met before this phone call, the call was workerly in nature—he suddenly started to cry. And my first impulse was to pull back from this unexpectedness rawness—not that I would have hung up the phone or anything, but I guess my first impulse would be to pretend that this wasn't happening, don't embarrass him, don't call attention to the fact he's crying, don't ask about it, don't pry, I'm not sure I really want to hear it anyway; let him pull himself together, and then move on with our conversation like it hadn't happened.

Fortunately—here's the intervention of grace—I didn't do that. Instead I waited—which I guess sounds like what I said had been my first impulse ("don't say anything"), except that I wasn't pulling back. Literally, the opposite: my mental disposition was that of leaning forward, being open to whatever he might want to say. And then I don't remember exactly what happened. He pulled himself together. I asked him if he was all right—trying to make it clear from my voice that I wasn't saying it in a "You're all right now? So we can move on then?" kind of way, but that I was open to listening to whatever he might want to say. Which turned out not to be much; he wasn't interested in pouring himself out. But that moment passed, and we finished our business, and that was that. Without embarrassment.

I've been in similar situations where someone did start pouring out in a way I hadn't really expected—or that I had expected might happen but knew I was going to find uncomfortable. And I'm grateful for the occasions when I've felt that I received the grace to be more open than is my nature. More present. Listening. Trying to share someone else's burden, I guess would be the "Mosiah 18" way to put it. Now that I've followed the Spirit this far and said all this, I'm feeling very embarrassed about what a ridiculously small grace this is. Ooh, I was able to be a listening ear for someone. Wow. What a burden I took on. I mean, it's not like I've ever taken on long-term responsibility for caring for someone who was sick or disabled. But for what it's worth, there's my little testimony of Christ working in me to reach out to people who are sick or grieving. Small and simple things, right? I'm going to have to trust the Spirit that my having written these words will do good for somebody.

************

Jesus—

I'm feeling a little humiliated right now, I have to tell you.
Perhaps that was what you had in mind. If so, that's fair.

I know I'm not a compassionate person.
In fact, let's be honest: as I was reading 3 Nephi 17-19 and thinking about how those chapters provide concrete images of your love, I was thinking about that basically in terms of your love for me. Which was a selfish way to read.
Not that that will come as any surprise to you, of course.

I'd like to be more compassionate.
I'd like to be more other-oriented, less stupidly self-absorbed.
I'd like to be more like the way you're described in the chapters I read for today.

That's what I'll be praying for when I take the sacrament today.

Amen.