Becoming Who We Are

“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, thought like a child, reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.” Perhaps you will recognize that famous line as the 11th verse of chapter 13 in the New Testament writing called 1st Corinthians. Wouldn’t it be a different world if that was true? Maybe it was true for the writer, Paul of Tarsus, but he’s the same man who, in a different letter to a different church, described himself as a “wretched man,” torn between right and wrong, good and evil. He describes the contest within his mind: I do things I don’t want to do and I leave undone the things I should do. Want and should.

“Tommy, when you play in the sandbox with Billy, you should be thoughtful and kind to him.” “I guess so, Mamma, but he has a toy that I want.” Maybe Tommy will develop a higher moral system when he grows up; maybe he will be introduced to something called a “conscience,” that inner voice that someone once called “the representative of God.” Let no one say, though, that it’s easy to live by the “should” and ignore the “want.” When “want” is out of control, power and greed and popularity become delicious poisons whose lethality is not limited to the one person. Many are infected. Many suffer.

When adult human beings insist on acting like childish human beings, when bragging, boasting and bravado become virtues, those who still hear that inner voice of conscience are faced with tough decisions. Moral decisions. Ethical decisions. Spiritual decisions. Paul of Tarsus, probably in despair, threw up his hands and exclaimed: “who will save me from this body of death?” Who will rescue me from the collision of conscience and childishness? And Paul concludes: “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” God? Intervening? Solving our problems while we watch? No, but speaking to our hearts, whispering in our minds, calling us to be who we claim to be. The moral imperatives of conscience still exist in good people; they are in the DNA of human beings.

For the welfare of nations and for the benefit of the least among us, we need to listen to the still, small voice. From the integrity of who we are, we need to listen and respond to the highest calling, the welfare of all creation.