10/24/07

The Parable of the Laborer; A Portrait of a Woman Caught Between Two Worlds by Lynn Cross


The Parable of the Laborer
A Portrait of a Woman Caught Between Two Worlds

`The next thing I perceived was a woman, if you want to call her that; gnarled, broken and bent, with wrinkles spread over her face like a spider’s web. She was explaining to the Spirit that she needed to fix the lands in this place so that the ghosts would have no problem walking on the hard grass. She wanted to be given tools to make the rough places smooth and the way made easier. The spirit stopped her and told her that by doing it herself that way would not make the rough places smooth. The way had already been made for her if she would just trust. The way wasn’t rough to those whom God had let do the smoothing. She said she really wanted the tools; that her hands, which when I looked at them were course, her knuckles were bulging from many years of work and labor. She insisted that her hands were meant for much labor and she wanted to begin right away. The spirit told her to be still, to know He was God. She began a tirade of trying to explain to the spirit that she knew that, but she had worked all her life and she wasn’t about to stop now. Didn’t the spirit know that she had raised children, worked to make sure they were happy all moments? She did all their laundry; cooking, cleaning, education-when had spent umpteen hours driving them about wherever they needed to go so they could better themselves. And, not one time had she thought of herself, but they were ungrateful in the end…telling her they didn’t need her anymore. She again began saying that she didn’t have time to be “still”; she had the church to attend to, too. Didn’t the spirit know how many people had passed through her doors, how many people she had fed, clothed and they never seemed to be satisfied. She could not be still. She had been completely busy all her life and she wasn’t going to stop now. She had asked God to help her, but there were always voices that told her something else had to be done. Always one more seminar to attend, one more study to prepare, one more “super curriculum” that would surely fix her children! And if only her husband had listened to that famous preacher from New York-he would be changed as well. Couldn’t he see that with all she had to do she could not be still? She said one more time if only she could make the rough places smooth, the ghosts would be able to walk to heaven on their own. She kept begging him till her back was bowed, her fingers more gnarled, and the burden on her back was the size of an elephant.
I protested to my guide, “Don’t you see how unfair this is? Can’t stop this? This woman worked all her life, never stopped living for others’ happiness and not her own. Can’t you stop this?” My guide replied, “Oh, but that is where you have it all wrong. She has become all she is because she thought to work to please was the aim of it all; it was a twisted, selfish love. Duty was her master. She did not look to the Master of all duty, and simply love and be still. In the end, she was living only for herself, and is still trying to be Him who ultimately makes the rough places smooth. To be still would have caused her to face her insufficiency at doing any of it. He says, “Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden I will give you rest, take my yoke upon you and learn from me.”
The last I saw of the woman, she was down on all fours scraping with her own hands the grass in that place. Her hands were bleeding, her knees torn to pieces, but she kept right on muttering under breath, “If I don’t do it no one will, over and over again, as she was escorted back to hell.

1 comments:

b said...

I like this! I've been checking your blog every so often and there was never anything posted....and now ALL this! How great! B.

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