Lemonade and love
How does one assess spiritual growth?
For some time I’d been praying about this while secretly wondering how I was doing. Surprisingly, I found my answer in the refrigerator!
A friend of mine had joined me in my home for a couple of weeks to help me sort and organize some files. Before she arrived, I stocked my refrigerator with a wide variety of cool drinks, including grape, pomegranate, orange, and my absolute favorite, lemonade.
You can imagine my dismay when, at the end of the first week, the other flavors remained untouched, and the supply of lemonade was seriously dwindling.
So, I did what I thought was obvious. Not wishing to restock the fridge while there were still plenty of drinks around—or be deprived of my favorite—I took the last bottle of lemonade and hid it on the bottom shelf.
This takes us back to the start—to those prayers about spiritual growth. I love to use the first chapter in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy (titled “Prayer”) as a kind of guidebook for my prayers. Mrs. Eddy urges her readers to pray for spiritual progress. “What we most need,” she writes, “is the prayer of fervent desire for growth in grace, expressed in patience, meekness, love, and good deeds” (p. 4 ). I had been praying for this kind of growth, but I wasn’t sure what else I could do to foster it besides praying sincerely and persistently.
Mrs. Eddy adds a few pages later: “The test of all prayer lies in the answer to these questions: Do we love our neighbor better because of this asking? Do we pursue the old selfishness, satisfied with having prayed for something better, though we give no evidence of the sincerity of our requests by living consistently with our prayer? If selfishness has given place to kindness, we shall regard our neighbor unselfishly, and bless them that curse us; but we shall never meet this great duty simply by asking that it may be done” (p. 9 ).
At first, hiding the lemonade on the bottom shelf appeared innocuous to me. There were plenty of other tasty drinks in the fridge for my friend to enjoy. I was being a thoughtful, loving hostess by providing drinks anyway. But then, as I was reflecting on Mrs. Eddy’s test of prayer, I felt impelled to ask myself whether my call for spiritual growth was truly consistent with my expression of love toward my friend. Was I really showing love for my neighbor by hiding the lemonade, yet bowing before God in prayer and asking for growth in grace?
Every day we face opportunities for spiritual growth that we need not miss.
I was suddenly at a sort of spiritual crossroads. One way: spiritual growth. The other: less than neighborly behavior. A challenging decision, but not really difficult, I realized, as I thought of Bible teachings I loved dearly. I remembered Christ Jesus’ reply to a lawyer who asked him what was the greatest commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. ... And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37, 39 ).
As silly as the lemonade incident at first appeared, I quickly realized that it posed a direct and revealing question to me about my prayers in practice. Hiding the lemonade suddenly seemed demeaning to me, and unloving toward the friend who was doing so much to help me. I reorganized the drinks in my fridge and made sure that my friend enjoyed the last lemonade.
I won a small battle over self through that experience, and gained ground in recognizing and defeating subtle suggestions of selfishness cloaked in half-hearted generosity. Making decisions where the underlying motive is based on selfishness, dishonesty, anger, or willfulness doesn’t foster spiritual growth or conform to God’s law of love. Sometimes we make decisions without really thinking what we are doing. Spiritual progress comes when we think about our actions in the context of God’s laws, and act according to our highest understanding of what is right and loving. The corrections we make, and the triumphs we have over impulsive or impure thoughts or actions reveal our true spiritual progress.
In the Old Testament there are many passages that emphasize the importance of the holy law of love—specifically loving God supremely, and one’s neighbor as well. I have always been impressed that the early Hebrews extended this love to foreigners living among them and to strangers.
In the New Testament, one of the most helpful examples of good neighborliness is Jesus’ parable of the good Samaritan (see Luke 10:29–37 ), and in his declarations that we love and bless even our enemies (see Matthew 5:44 ). Jesus systematically defines all human relationships through the lens of God’s love. There is no relationship we can envision—be it labeled servant or master, friend or foe, family or stranger, citizen or foreigner—that doesn’t deserve the fullest expression of love.
As I see it, many people are openly yearning and quietly praying to love more. Prayer for growth in grace can help them make wise choices when they come to a crossroads where their love for others is tested. Every day we face opportunities for spiritual growth that we need not miss. We can view these opportunities as answers to our prayers. Our “lemonade experiences” can transform us if we practice what we pray for, and love others as they deserve to be loved.
