A Lesson from Trash

Saturday 4/27/19 5:47 AM

As I was walking home from the gym this morning at about 5:30, I saw a used paper towel in the parking lot. I stopped to pick it up so I could throw it in the trash can by the bus stop on my way home. As I continued walking across the lot, I saw more trash and an aluminum can that I added to my trash stash. When I went to cross the street, there was more trash in the gutter that I also picked up. I went to the trash can and emptied my hands of the trash only to see more trash about ten feet past the trash can. I picked that up too and returned to the can to dispose of it. As I threw it away, I thought to myself, “God’s world is a little cleaner than it was before.” There were not many people on the road at that time of the day so there were only a couple cars that passed. I was secretly hoping someone saw me and even thought it would be nice if a police officer saw me and cited me for doing a good deed. While I continued my walk home, I wondered why I wanted the recognition from others for picking up the trash rather than being content with doing it to make God’s world cleaner than it was before.

I’m not alone in those feelings. Henri Nouwen writes a prayer in his book, A Cry for Mercy, that I also prayed this morning. “Why do I keep looking for popularity, respect from others, success, acclaim, and for sensual pleasures? Why, Lord, is it so hard for me to make you the only one? Why do I keep hesitating to surrender myself totally to you? Help me, O Lord, to let my old self die, to let die the thousand big and small ways in which I am still building up my false self and trying to cling to my false desires.  Let me be reborn in you and see through you the world in the right way, so that all my actions, words, and thought can become a hymn of praise to you.”