It's been floating around the Internet.
You may have seen the poem, "Anyway," on a social media site or, perhaps, as a poster on someone's wall. The poem is usually attributed to Mother Teresa.
It's sprinkled with thoughts like:
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish motives.
BE KIND ANYWAY
If you are honest and sincere, people may deceive you.
BE HONEST AND SINCERE ANYWAY
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow.
DO GOOD ANYWAY
It is a thought-provoking poem, filled with lovely ideas. The only problem is, Mother Teresa didn't write it.
In 1968, 19-year old Kent Keith, a Harvard sophomore, wrote the first draft of "Anyway: The Paradoxical Commandments," as part of a book for student leaders. There were ten of those "commandments," all of which were intended to reflect the teachings of Jesus. If you compare it to the poem, you will immediately recognize that, with the exception of the final two lines, they are identical.
The confusion comes about because Mother Theresa loved the Paradoxical Commandments, too; so much so, she had them blown up and hung them on the wall of Shishu Bhavan, the children's home in Calcutta. People saw them there and assumed the words were hers.
While most of us will agree, it is always important to know the true author, there are times when the importance and universality of the message may transcend the author, time, place, and original audience. That is the situation in this week's Lectionary scriptures; and because of that, you should read them all.
In Leviticus, God instructs the Israelites on how to treat people with respect, and He ends with "Love you neighbors as yourselves." In Matthew, Jesus, shockingly, tells his Disciples that they need to love the very people they would ordinarily choose to NOT love. In the selection from Psalm 119, the Psalmist begs God for the kind of understanding needed to "turn my heart to your decrees." Paul tells the Corinthians to avoid becoming worldly-wise, to instead become God's fool, and he ends with, "So then, no more boasting about human leaders! All things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Peter or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are of Christ, and Christ is of God.”
We need to treat these scriptures the way Mother Teresa treated Dr. Keith's poem. She knew someone else wrote those words, but she so desired to do them herself, she hung them up on the wall, anyway.
All of this week's Lectionary selections were written down at different times, by different people, for different people.
We need to follow them, anyway.
_________________________
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany (February 19, 2017)
http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/lections.php?year=A&season=Epiphany
Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18
Psalm 119:33-40
1 Corinthians 3:10-11, 16-23
Matthew 5:38-48
________________________
I hope you can join us Friday morning at Lectionary Breakfast at the Waco "Egg and I" restaurant. We meet at 8:00 and wrap thing up around 9:00. Come if you can. We're reading the words of others, but we are learning to do them, anyway.
Blessings,
Steve
_________________________
NOTES
1. Dr. Keith's take on the Mother Teresa connection makes fascinating reading: http://www.kentmkeith.com/mother_teresa.html
2. Dr. Keith's book is still in print; you can buy it at Amazon and many national retail outlets.
3. The photo is from http://quotespictures.net/17609/it-was-never-between-you-and-them-anyway-mother-teresa
4. Bible quotes are from the NIV.
No comments:
Post a Comment