Simple Love

“Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.” – Jeremiah 33:3

Simple Love

I have always been afraid of the cost of loving those who are suffering deeply. This fear came up immediately on this trip. The first day we walked into the orphanage we were immediately presented with the faces and bodies of children who have suffered more than I can ever imagine. We walked from the peaceful gardens in the compound to dim hallways that smelled of urine, body odor, and sickness.

In the orphanage there are five rooms, in which the children are organized according to their age and the severity of their illness. Room one has the sickest babies; room five has the older and healthier kids. The first room I saw was room one. Tears came to my eyes to see these children with sores on their faces, shrunken bodies, crying eyes. That is when the grace of God met me.

I walked over to one of the cribs and looked down at a little girl. She was crying in pain, her body was covered with scabies and large sores. But, when I bent down to say hello to her she smiled at me. That was when I saw it, the person, the little girl. There was a person there, even covered with all that pain. Suddenly air in the room felt lighter, the smell didn’t make me nauseous, and my heart lifted. In the eyes of that AIDS baby I saw the truth. Regardless of our pain and suffering, we retain the ability to feel and respond to love. The challenge of Compassion is to look at the person and not see what is wrong with them, but to see their soul shining back at you. Then, the small acts of service; changing a diaper, spooning gruel into a mouth, washing the wounded, all those acts become acts of a simple and great love. Simple things, done with great love, become extraordinary acts of kindness.

In the words of another visitor to Mother Theresa;
“Accompanying Mother Theresa, as we did, to the Home for the Dying, to the lepers and unwanted children, I found I went through three phases. The first was horror mixed with pity, the second compassion pure and simple, and the third, reaching far beyond compassion something I had never experienced before- an awareness that these dying and derelict men and women, these lepers with stumps instead of hands these unwanted children were not pitiable, repulsive or forlorn, but rather dear and delightful; as it might be, friends of long standing, brothers and sisters.” – Malcolm Muggeridge

May God grant that I am able to see people with new eyes, the eyes of one who looks past what is wrong with them and sees the person, created in the image of God. I want to see a person who is worthy to love and be loved. Jesus, make it so.