In his novel The Vicar’s Daughter, George MacDonald (edited by Dan Hamilton) describes the huddled masses in 19th century London.
“…the people who hurried or sauntered along looked inscrutable. Where could they live? Had they anybody to love them? Were their hearts quiet under their dingy cloaks and shabby coats?...
“[W]hat would [we] give for a peep into the mysteries of all these worlds that go crowding past us. If we could but see through the opaque husk of them, some would glitter and glow like diamond mines. Others would perhaps look mere earthy holes, some of them forsaken quarries, with a great pool of stagnant water in the bottom, some like vast coal pits of gloom, into which you dared not carry a lighted lamp for fear of explosion. Some would be mere lumber rooms, and others ill-arranged libraries, without a poet’s corner anywhere. But what a wealth of creation they show, and what infinite room for hope it affords!...
“[S]hall I doubt that God can see good very clearly where my mole eyes can see none? Just as He is keen-eyed for the evil in his creatures in order to destroy it, He would, if it were possible, be yet keener-eyed for the good to nourish and cherish it. If men would only side with the good that is in them, and that the seed should grow, and bring forth fruit!”
These are the words of a humble Christian serving the poor, spoken by Miss Clare, whom we shall visit again two blog posts from now.
But might these words also describe the scattered, dis-unified body of Christ, individual believers trudging through an evil world without unity, stagnant pools with fresh flow?
Yet doesn’t God see what we cannot see, the grand potential of the unity Jesus prayed for? And is he not even now nourishing and cherishing it?
Be like Miss Clare. Look around. Your true family is right before your eyes.
It is time for a new dawn.
“…the people who hurried or sauntered along looked inscrutable. Where could they live? Had they anybody to love them? Were their hearts quiet under their dingy cloaks and shabby coats?...
“[W]hat would [we] give for a peep into the mysteries of all these worlds that go crowding past us. If we could but see through the opaque husk of them, some would glitter and glow like diamond mines. Others would perhaps look mere earthy holes, some of them forsaken quarries, with a great pool of stagnant water in the bottom, some like vast coal pits of gloom, into which you dared not carry a lighted lamp for fear of explosion. Some would be mere lumber rooms, and others ill-arranged libraries, without a poet’s corner anywhere. But what a wealth of creation they show, and what infinite room for hope it affords!...
“[S]hall I doubt that God can see good very clearly where my mole eyes can see none? Just as He is keen-eyed for the evil in his creatures in order to destroy it, He would, if it were possible, be yet keener-eyed for the good to nourish and cherish it. If men would only side with the good that is in them, and that the seed should grow, and bring forth fruit!”
These are the words of a humble Christian serving the poor, spoken by Miss Clare, whom we shall visit again two blog posts from now.
But might these words also describe the scattered, dis-unified body of Christ, individual believers trudging through an evil world without unity, stagnant pools with fresh flow?
Yet doesn’t God see what we cannot see, the grand potential of the unity Jesus prayed for? And is he not even now nourishing and cherishing it?
Be like Miss Clare. Look around. Your true family is right before your eyes.
It is time for a new dawn.
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