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O Wisdom...
Dec. 16th, 2004 06:00 pmO Wisdom, you came forth from the mouth of the Most High and reach from one end of the earth to the other, mightily and sweetly ordering all things. O come and teach us the way of prudence.
This is the first of the "Great O's," the antiphons on the Magnificat at Vespers in the octave leading up to Christmas. Depending on tradition they start today (Dec. 16) or tomorrow; if you use the last one, "O Virgin of virgins," then you start today. (If you want to see a bit more about them, visit a page I did as part of my web certification; it's ages old, but I'm still a kind of proud of it.)
I can't reproduce the music here...but I can comment a bit on the reading for the day, and the significance it has for me.
I am not, customarily, very wise. I push myself harder than I have strength for, drive myself farther than I can really afford to go...and pay for it later, sometimes physically, sometimes emotionally...sometimes both. I have permanent nerve damage to my right lower back and leg, as a result of stubbornly "soldiering on" and refusing to seek appropriate treatment until the damage had become essentially irreversible.
And I've just been called upon to go the extra mile again for my company. My company that kept me on the road and away from home and family and friends and singing for a year. My company that then turned around and told me "no raise" for the third year in a row. My company that just recently said "we're dropping the health insurance you've had, so you have to pick one of these two (crappy) plans which is all we'll offer."
And I've been feeling pretty spiteful and bitter about that. I don't really have a choice; if I want to keep my job, I go where they tell me and when, and right now, it's the only job I have. And to be honest, I don't want to lose credit with the person who suggested that they bring me into the project for which I must travel. The company's opinion doesn't matter a tinker's damn to me, but his opinion does.
Regardless, I've been feeling very spiteful about it, and sulky and stubborn, and sort of thinking, "Okay, I'll do this, but I won't enjoy it and I'll make you pay through the nose for every slight you've shown me and every fun thing you make me miss." And feeling bad about that, and un-Christmas-y and unChristian besides, but not really knowing what to do about it.
And then I read evening prayer from a lovely booklet I picked up a few years ago, Hasten the Kingdom: Praying the O Antiphons of Advent, by Mary Winifred, who was a sister of the Community of the Holy Spirit. It has the music that I can't reproduce here - being a singer, I've always wanted to learn to sing these antiphons - and a short, simple prayer service for each of the eight days of the antiphons.
And there in the readings is an answer to what I've been feeling and seeking...
From Wisdom 9:1, 9-11 (emphasis mine)
The meditation for the day spoke of how the first thing we need, to prepare for God's coming into our lives, is good sense. Not stubborn pride, not insistence on our own way or the highway. Not frantic cleaning or shopping or wrapping, when there isn't time. Not driving ourselves to exhaustion, both mental and physical, or giving more of ourselves than we really have to give - knowing our limits, and accepting rather than trying vainly to surpass them.
So out of this came two things, possibly related.
I'm prone to going Christmas-crazy, shopping and cooking and cleaning like mad, only to wake up the day after Christmas feeling like I missed it all, because I haven't had time to sit down with my favorite Christmas book (Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol), or watch Rudolph and Frosty and Charlie Brown, or just sit quietly by the tree...I often find I have not been prudent, in my preparations, not left my lamp filled with enough oil to burn brightly when it counts. So all the franticness I was starting to feel - I have to shop, I have to wrap, I have to write cards - sort of melted away into "I have to use common sense, do what I can, and not feel guilty for what I can't do."
And at the same time, I felt a dawning realization that my bitterness, my sulkiness, my spitefulness is simply not prudent, not wise. They are unhealthy for me, and can only endanger what is otherwise a good working relationship with a person who has done good things for me in the past, and intends only good for me in the present and future. What is asked is not unreasonable, not beyond my limits. It is true that I will miss singing one concert with my ensemble, but I won't lose the joy of having performed with them in the past, nor the promise of that joy again in the future.
Wisdom says, "be the best you can be, do the work you are given, go where you are sent without complaint. See the big picture, not the tiny detail. Two months out of a lifetime is as nothing, but the reward for doing well and being wise lasts a lifetime and beyond."
It isn't about whether the people I serve are deserving. It isn't even necessarily about the work itself; it has been known to happen that I've been sent on an out-of-town assignment for the company's purposes, only to discover that God had reason for me to be there that had nothing to do with the job I was doing, but was equally - perhaps even more - important. I'm sure the company wasn't aware of acting as God's agent, but there you are - they didn't need to know.
So I shall endeavor to be wise, to be prudent, and try to see whatever it is that God is bringing into my life with an open mind and heart. And suddenly I feel ever so much more ready for Christmas...
This is the first of the "Great O's," the antiphons on the Magnificat at Vespers in the octave leading up to Christmas. Depending on tradition they start today (Dec. 16) or tomorrow; if you use the last one, "O Virgin of virgins," then you start today. (If you want to see a bit more about them, visit a page I did as part of my web certification; it's ages old, but I'm still a kind of proud of it.)
I can't reproduce the music here...but I can comment a bit on the reading for the day, and the significance it has for me.
I am not, customarily, very wise. I push myself harder than I have strength for, drive myself farther than I can really afford to go...and pay for it later, sometimes physically, sometimes emotionally...sometimes both. I have permanent nerve damage to my right lower back and leg, as a result of stubbornly "soldiering on" and refusing to seek appropriate treatment until the damage had become essentially irreversible.
And I've just been called upon to go the extra mile again for my company. My company that kept me on the road and away from home and family and friends and singing for a year. My company that then turned around and told me "no raise" for the third year in a row. My company that just recently said "we're dropping the health insurance you've had, so you have to pick one of these two (crappy) plans which is all we'll offer."
And I've been feeling pretty spiteful and bitter about that. I don't really have a choice; if I want to keep my job, I go where they tell me and when, and right now, it's the only job I have. And to be honest, I don't want to lose credit with the person who suggested that they bring me into the project for which I must travel. The company's opinion doesn't matter a tinker's damn to me, but his opinion does.
Regardless, I've been feeling very spiteful about it, and sulky and stubborn, and sort of thinking, "Okay, I'll do this, but I won't enjoy it and I'll make you pay through the nose for every slight you've shown me and every fun thing you make me miss." And feeling bad about that, and un-Christmas-y and unChristian besides, but not really knowing what to do about it.
And then I read evening prayer from a lovely booklet I picked up a few years ago, Hasten the Kingdom: Praying the O Antiphons of Advent, by Mary Winifred, who was a sister of the Community of the Holy Spirit. It has the music that I can't reproduce here - being a singer, I've always wanted to learn to sing these antiphons - and a short, simple prayer service for each of the eight days of the antiphons.
And there in the readings is an answer to what I've been feeling and seeking...
From Wisdom 9:1, 9-11 (emphasis mine)
O God of my ancestors and Lord of my mercy,
who have made all things by your word...
With you is wisdom, she who knows your works
and was present when you made the world;
she understands what is pleasing in your sight
and what is right according to your commandments.
Send her forth from the holy heavens,
and from the throne of your glory send her,
that she may labor at my side,
and that I may learn what is pleasing to you.
For she knows and understands all things,
and she will guide me wisely in my actions
and guard me with her glory.
The meditation for the day spoke of how the first thing we need, to prepare for God's coming into our lives, is good sense. Not stubborn pride, not insistence on our own way or the highway. Not frantic cleaning or shopping or wrapping, when there isn't time. Not driving ourselves to exhaustion, both mental and physical, or giving more of ourselves than we really have to give - knowing our limits, and accepting rather than trying vainly to surpass them.
So out of this came two things, possibly related.
I'm prone to going Christmas-crazy, shopping and cooking and cleaning like mad, only to wake up the day after Christmas feeling like I missed it all, because I haven't had time to sit down with my favorite Christmas book (Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol), or watch Rudolph and Frosty and Charlie Brown, or just sit quietly by the tree...I often find I have not been prudent, in my preparations, not left my lamp filled with enough oil to burn brightly when it counts. So all the franticness I was starting to feel - I have to shop, I have to wrap, I have to write cards - sort of melted away into "I have to use common sense, do what I can, and not feel guilty for what I can't do."
And at the same time, I felt a dawning realization that my bitterness, my sulkiness, my spitefulness is simply not prudent, not wise. They are unhealthy for me, and can only endanger what is otherwise a good working relationship with a person who has done good things for me in the past, and intends only good for me in the present and future. What is asked is not unreasonable, not beyond my limits. It is true that I will miss singing one concert with my ensemble, but I won't lose the joy of having performed with them in the past, nor the promise of that joy again in the future.
Wisdom says, "be the best you can be, do the work you are given, go where you are sent without complaint. See the big picture, not the tiny detail. Two months out of a lifetime is as nothing, but the reward for doing well and being wise lasts a lifetime and beyond."
It isn't about whether the people I serve are deserving. It isn't even necessarily about the work itself; it has been known to happen that I've been sent on an out-of-town assignment for the company's purposes, only to discover that God had reason for me to be there that had nothing to do with the job I was doing, but was equally - perhaps even more - important. I'm sure the company wasn't aware of acting as God's agent, but there you are - they didn't need to know.
So I shall endeavor to be wise, to be prudent, and try to see whatever it is that God is bringing into my life with an open mind and heart. And suddenly I feel ever so much more ready for Christmas...
