St David's Day (2010)
I've made it a habit to remember St David's Day, the first day of March in every year. It is a day with great significance in the calendars and journals of my kinsmen. St David is the patron saint of Wales, and one of his most well-remembered sayings there is this: "Do the little things in life." It sounds very different from the modern axiom, "Don't sweat the small stuff."
However, there is a point at which the two are reconciled. Perhaps the gospel of Luke says it well:
[Jesus] said to them, "Take heed! Beware of covetousness: for a man's life consists not in the abundance of the things which he possesses.
And [Jesus] spake a parable unto them, saying, "The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully; he thought within himself, saying, 'What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?' And he said, 'This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to my soul — Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.'
"But God said to him, 'You fool, this night your soul shall be required of you: then whose shall those things be, which you have provided?' So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God."
And [Jesus] said to his disciples, "Therefore I say to you, Take no thought for your life, what you shall eat; neither for the body, what you shall wear. The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment. Consider the ravens: for they neither sow nor reap; they have neither storehouse nor barn, and God feedeth them. How much more are you better off than they?"
It's true that we shouldn't sweat the small stuff, then. But it's also true that we should continue to do what good we can in the little things, the small things, the despised things, the 'sai kang' warrior's stock-in-trade. We are ravens, we are the fingers of God's hands in the world of men.
It is not for us to build larger and larger barns, storehouses, churches, schools, monuments, statues and other things of wood and stone, steel and glass. Some will say, "But this is how we glorify God." Yet these are not the sacrifices that He wants. He wants less of that, and more of us.
What the Welsh remember of St David is somewhat abbreviated. This is what he really said:
"Be joyful, and keep your faith and your creed. Do the little things that you have seen me do and heard about. I will walk the path that our fathers have trod before us."
If the children of the wyvern — if those whose blood runs red, and blue, and gold in the valleys of the nightmare — can do the small things well, then the grand endeavours that we cannot see will succeed. God is not mocked; men will reap what they have sown, and the harvest will be great indeed.
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[ Other St David's Day posts ]
However, there is a point at which the two are reconciled. Perhaps the gospel of Luke says it well:
[Jesus] said to them, "Take heed! Beware of covetousness: for a man's life consists not in the abundance of the things which he possesses.
And [Jesus] spake a parable unto them, saying, "The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully; he thought within himself, saying, 'What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits?' And he said, 'This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to my soul — Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.'
"But God said to him, 'You fool, this night your soul shall be required of you: then whose shall those things be, which you have provided?' So is he that lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God."
And [Jesus] said to his disciples, "Therefore I say to you, Take no thought for your life, what you shall eat; neither for the body, what you shall wear. The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment. Consider the ravens: for they neither sow nor reap; they have neither storehouse nor barn, and God feedeth them. How much more are you better off than they?"
It's true that we shouldn't sweat the small stuff, then. But it's also true that we should continue to do what good we can in the little things, the small things, the despised things, the 'sai kang' warrior's stock-in-trade. We are ravens, we are the fingers of God's hands in the world of men.
It is not for us to build larger and larger barns, storehouses, churches, schools, monuments, statues and other things of wood and stone, steel and glass. Some will say, "But this is how we glorify God." Yet these are not the sacrifices that He wants. He wants less of that, and more of us.
What the Welsh remember of St David is somewhat abbreviated. This is what he really said:
"Be joyful, and keep your faith and your creed. Do the little things that you have seen me do and heard about. I will walk the path that our fathers have trod before us."
If the children of the wyvern — if those whose blood runs red, and blue, and gold in the valleys of the nightmare — can do the small things well, then the grand endeavours that we cannot see will succeed. God is not mocked; men will reap what they have sown, and the harvest will be great indeed.
=====
[ Other St David's Day posts ]
etched with acid at 12:25:00 am
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