Wednesday, December 19, 2001

REWARDS

Read: Matthew 10:40-42

I have had dogs most of my adult life. An Alaskan Husky (big!) a Shih-Tzu, a Lhasa/Westie mix, and currently a Poodle/Bichon Frise mix. I love dogs over all, with their ingratiating ways. Dogs have a way of making you feel like you're the center of the universe, mourned in our absences and cheered in our homecomings.

I have trained every one of my dogs myself, and if there is anything I know about dogs, it's that they perform best for a reward. When they're puppies, this means treats. Liver bits, cheese bits, pieces of real meat a reward for a trick, even half done, spurs a puppy to perform. I ask for the trick, and the puppy is so eager, he's trying to get his nose in my hand, since he can easily smell that it's something wonderful.

At the same time, I'm petting the puppy and telling her she's wonderful: "What a good dog! What a smart dog!" The puppy loves being told she's loved, dances for me to pet her, runs to me because coming to me might mean a treat and definitely means she gets my praise. Little by little, the puppy learns how to do the trick, and as she learns, I withhold some of the rewards. It's no longer enough that the tail touches the ground it has to stay there for several seconds. It's no longer enough to try to roll over; he has to succeed to get the reward.

Sometimes in our lives it feels as though God isn't here anymore. We've been walking in a certain way, and it's been hard, but we've learned how to get the job done. We perhaps had a real sense of God walking with us for a long time, but now we don't. And we wonder, "Did I miss a turn here? Did I get too comfortable? When did it happen, exactly, that I stopped hearing God's voice, feeling that Presence with me?" We think it's a failure on our part (can't be a failure on God's part, so this is the only explanation).

I suspect that there may be another explanation, and you've probably guessed what I'm aiming at here. I suspect that a good deal of the time that "dark night of the soul" is really an indication that we're doing just fine, we're on the right path, we really are getting stronger, better, finer. But God is not so quick to "reward" us with a sense of "well done, good and faithful servant" precisely because we should be able to do our task as a matter of course now. We've been working on it for a while, and we've had some material successes; we've picked up on the goal that God has set for us, and therefore we don't need a huge compliment from God to keep us going.

Every faithful servant of God has had this experience, even more so for the "great saints" whose autobiographies are part of the landscape of our faith. So I take courage. Maybe God has more faith in me than I have. Maybe I'm doing better than I had thought. I still need to be listening to my Master. I don't get to do tricks when and how I think I should. But maybe I'm not so far off of my Christian walk as I had feared.

Sandra Herrmann

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