Richard W. Church
The truth is, that what a man is is much more shown in his common words and doings than in his uncommon and seldom ones; and therefore it is these common words and doings which are of even more importance than what we call greater occasions. It may chance that a person who is peevish and ill-natured to people about him may be greatly touched by some case of distress, and may even put himself to great trouble and inconvenience to relieve it. It is a good thing that he should do so. Perhaps he may look on it as a proof of his ready sense of duty, of his love to Christ; [and] perhaps he gives little thought to the peevishness and ill-nature which prevail generally in what he says and does. But I greatly doubt whether this continual bad temper which is showing itself in the small events of life is not a much more serious matter in Christ's eyes than any one service, however apparently great.
This then is the Christian rule, not for great occasions but for ordinary and common life; the rule not for once in a while but for all day long, for about the house and in the room with others; the rule not merely for what we do to others but for what we say to them, and not merely for what we say to them but for the way of saying it; the rule against any vexing of others not by word only but by look and manner, and unkind tone of voice, or unkind holding our tongue. Who can tell the unkindness and uncharitableness and selfishness which is spread over the whole of our lives in our everyday going out and coming in, in the short speeches and even the short "yes" and "no" which pass between us--which wound, and sting, and provoke without our caring or troubling ourselves about it!
"We then who are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let every one of us please his neighbor for his good to edification. For even Christ pleased not Himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them who reproached Thee fell on me." (Romans 15:1-3)
St. Paul here gives us the rule for our behavior to one another in the common everyday concerns of life; in the hundreds and thousands of little matters that rise up between us all as we are joined together in families, or as acquaintances, or in employments; of the way we guide our words and deeds to those whom we meet with continually day after day.
I said just now, the little matters that rise up in our daily intercourse with one another. We call them little matters, and taken one by one they are, perhaps, so. But they are not at all little or of small consequence when taken all together. For, in fact, what is our whole life made up of but of these little matters? We are at our meals, or at our work, or we are chatting with people near us, or we are walking, or reading, or taking our pleasure. Small things in themselves, but they fill up our hours and days.
Great and serious actions and events do not make up our lives. It is not every day that we have an opportunity of helping some neighbor in trouble, or of bearing some great trial well, or of showing our patience in suffering. These things come only now and then. But our ordinary way of behaving to one another, our ordinary way of speaking to one another never stops. It goes on all day long, and from day to day, and from week to week.
Great and serious actions and events do not make up our lives. It is not every day that we have an opportunity of helping some neighbor in trouble, or of bearing some great trial well, or of showing our patience in suffering. These things come only now and then. But our ordinary way of behaving to one another, our ordinary way of speaking to one another never stops. It goes on all day long, and from day to day, and from week to week.
The truth is, that what a man is is much more shown in his common words and doings than in his uncommon and seldom ones; and therefore it is these common words and doings which are of even more importance than what we call greater occasions. It may chance that a person who is peevish and ill-natured to people about him may be greatly touched by some case of distress, and may even put himself to great trouble and inconvenience to relieve it. It is a good thing that he should do so. Perhaps he may look on it as a proof of his ready sense of duty, of his love to Christ; [and] perhaps he gives little thought to the peevishness and ill-nature which prevail generally in what he says and does. But I greatly doubt whether this continual bad temper which is showing itself in the small events of life is not a much more serious matter in Christ's eyes than any one service, however apparently great.
This then is the Christian rule, not for great occasions but for ordinary and common life; the rule not for once in a while but for all day long, for about the house and in the room with others; the rule not merely for what we do to others but for what we say to them, and not merely for what we say to them but for the way of saying it; the rule against any vexing of others not by word only but by look and manner, and unkind tone of voice, or unkind holding our tongue. Who can tell the unkindness and uncharitableness and selfishness which is spread over the whole of our lives in our everyday going out and coming in, in the short speeches and even the short "yes" and "no" which pass between us--which wound, and sting, and provoke without our caring or troubling ourselves about it!
