“I know your works, that you have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead." (Rev. 3:1) (Jesus speaking)
As the Church nears the close of the 2024 liturgical year, it continues to put a fine focus on what we look like inside; that is, our soul; that which is most important to Jesus.
From the simplest, to the most sophisticated of God's creatures, we learn, and we survive by understanding the 'cause' and 'effect' of all things - if we do this, this will happen. So, what is it that 'causes' us to be blind to the possibility that we are dead inside? The short answer is vanity or pride; a preoccupation of self (the ego) to the exclusion of God and neighbor.
Robert Burns wrote a literary masterpiece, a poem named "To the Louse (Lice)" in 1786. It is famously remembered by the closing stanza in which he says that if humans had the power to see themselves as others see them, it will change the perception of humankind - probably prevent many blunders. He was inspired when he noticed a louse crawling on a refined lady's bonnet, in church!
Lice are respecters of neither rich nor poor, saint nor sinner. Vanity is a blood-sucking tick that sucks the life out of us; left unchecked, possibly spiritual death. It is what causes the rich to suck blood out of the poor, wars within family, between neighbors, and between kings. Praise God, the Lord Jesus gave us the anti-dote; the bug repellent. It's humility!!! It has nothing to do with how we look on the outside but everything to do with how look on the inside!
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