A chunk of the year our marriage group discussions swiveled on one query.
"What do you need?"
It is based on the chapter in Matthew where Jesus describes six portals of care.
Feeding the hungry, quenching the thirsty, clothing the naked, tending the sick, welcoming the stranger, and visiting the imprisoned.
We look at those circumstances spiritually as well as literally, and try to decipher the voids in our own lives or those of people we love. Have we lost our purpose? Are we isolated? Are our routines hungry for meaning? Do we seem vulnerable, or stuck?
The other day a woman told me a story about her son who had been ill. She and her husband dove in with a complex regime of acupressure, nutritional supplements, homeopathy, vitamins, massage, and freshly squeezed juices. I pictured the boy, lying helplessly, yet being swathed in the attention of his parents. It made me tear up.
Of course they love him when he is well. In fact given a choice I expect they prefer it. Yet something of inestimable worth transpired in the absence of it.
Probably none of us would raise our hands and volunteer to be hurting, or excluded, famished or cold. Yet the repercussions of those maladies are an entrance point for devotion.
