Becoming Real: 40 Days with the Velveteen Rabbit 

Day 17 – Monday after Third Sunday of Lent – 8th March2010

To Read:

That night he was almost too happy to sleep, and so much love stirred in his little sawdust heart that it almost burst.  And into his boot-button eyes, that had long ago lost their polish, there came a look of wisdom and beauty, so that even Nana noticed it next morning when she picked him up, and said, “I declare if that old Bunny hasn’t got quite a knowing expression!”

from The Velveteen Rabbit
by Margery Williams

To Reflect:

Have you ever met a living saint?  Someone who, even if you did not know them well, their very expression took your breath away?  I remember meeting the Prioress of a Religious Community for the first time and in her face I saw what Nana in the Nursery would have recognised as ‘a knowing look’.  This was not a kind of ‘smugness’ (which some religious people easily show to those who are outside the community of faith) but a genuine look of ‘wisdom and beauty’ which stripped away the years which age had brought and transported those in her company into the presence of the one whom she worshipped.

I suppose how I felt was similar to the experience of the Sanhedrin when they were cross examining Peter and John for the ‘crime’ of healing a lame man;

The members of the Council were amazed to see how bold Peter and John were and to learn that they were ordinary men of no education. They realized then that they had been companions of  Jesus.                                                  (Acts 4.13)                                                                                       

I wonder if, when people look at us, they realise by our demeanour, our words, our extraordinary behaviour, that we too are ‘companions of Jesus’?  Is there a sparkle in our eyes – be they made of boot buttons or not?  Have we learnt to rest sufficiently in the all-encompassing love of our Lord?  Have we have developed a personal serenity which calls other people to spend time in the presence of God?

Today try to do be just a little less busy and a little more serene.  Allow others to find reflected in your life the proof of God’s love for them? 

To Pray:

God of Love,
through this Lenten journey, purify my desires to serve you.
Free me from any temptations to judge others,
to place myself above others.
Please let me surrender even my impatience with others,
that with your love and your grace,
I might be less and less absorbed with myself,
and more and more full of the desire to follow you,
in laying down my life according to your example.

© Andrew Dotchin – 2018