© 2000 Rev. Gregory Young
© 2000 The Christian Fellowship of Students of The Urantia Book
There is an interesting story of an unusual event that happened in a Broadway theater. It was a Friday night, and the theater was packed for a performance of Tennessee Williams’s The Night of the Iguana, starring the notable actress Dorothy McGuire. Just before the curtain was about to rise, a woman in the audience — an overweight, middle-aged woman in a blue print dress — startled the audience by suddenly shouting, “Start the show! Start the show! I want to see Dorothy McGuire. I love Dorothy McGuire!” Ushers and the house manager descended to try and reason with the woman. They reached out for her, but she pulled back and continued to shout, "I want to see Dorothy McGuire! Start the show!
After a moment of shocked silence, the people in the audience decided they had a maniac in their midst and began to get ugly, booing the woman and laughing derisively. “Throw her out!” someone yelled. The woman turned to the shouters, “All I want is to see Dorothy McGuire,” she said, “and then I will leave.” There was more laughing and booing — things were getting out of hand.
And then, from behind the curtains, Miss McGuire appeared. She crossed the stage and came over to the place where the woman was sitting, and with remarkable poise, and grace, and kindness, extended her hand toward the woman. Quietly, willingly, the woman took her hand, and Miss McGuire led her gently toward the exit. As they reached the back of the auditorium, Miss McGuire paused, turned toward the audience and said, “I’d like to introduce you to another fellow human being.”
I can’t help but think that this is what Jesus might have done in this situation. It seems to me that Jesus’ ministry was one in which he sought to introduce people to their own sense of humanity and the genuine humanity of others. Perhaps the primary message shared with us in the life and teachings of Jesus — repeated so many times in so many ways — is that we have value. We carry the imprint of our creator. We are created in the likeness of our divine parent, with the indwelling presence of God deep in our mind uniting with us as the co-creator of our soul.
Jesus had a high regard for everyone he met. He saw more in people than others saw, more than people saw in themselves. Why did Jesus spend so much time with the blind, the lame, the lepers, the dead of spirit? Why did he invite street people in to a feast fit for a king? Why did he touch the heart of an adulteress and the very soul of a harlot named Mary Magdalene? Why did he dine with the dreaded tax-collector? Why did he move the hearts of a centurion and of a thief hanging next to him on a cross? His love was always reaching out, always seeking to restore value.
Why did Jesus talk about us being the salt of the earth and the light of the world? Why did he talk of looking for lost sheep? Why did he heal a crippled man on the sabbath? Because we have value, worth, and are deeply cared about by God. We are very special in God’s eyes! Christ wants us to realize that we are human beings with unique attributes and special personal responsibilities and opportunities. We each have a purposeful agenda in the life that has been given to us!
Guy Doud, a teacher from the Brainard, Minnesota area, was selected as the teacher of the year for 1987-88. He is very good at what he does because he sees the value in each of the students that he teaches. He cares deeply for them and they know it and they respond to that kind of love. Guy was teaching a contemporary short story class. He gave students journal assignments every day; they had to write and write and write. Then they were supposed to react to the stories they read. According to Doud, they didn’t seem to understand the stories very well. But one girl was terrible! She never wrote a story — just a sentence. When Doud would try to talk with her, the walls went up. He sent notices home, hoping that her parents would do something to change her attitude and behavior. But it just made the communication worse.
Finally, at the end of six weeks, mid-trimester time, Doud gave the students a journal assignment asking them to write something they thought Doud should know about them personally. The only requirement was that they write the entire hour. Their papers were not going to be graded but they had to do the assignment if they wanted a midtrimester grade. That evening after Doud returned from a football game, he made himself a bowl of butter brickle ice-cream and sat down to read the student’s papers.
He came to this girl’s paper and found that page after page was filled. She started, “I know you don’t like me because I’m dumb. But I’m not as dumb as you think I am. You see, last summer I had an abortion.” And then she went on to tell the whole story. She poured out her pain in the paper-how she got pregnant and ran away from home, how her boyfriend had moved away from her out to the west coast. “If I can’t be with my boyfriend” she wrote, “I’d just as soon be dead!” And she started listing all of the ways she’d considered using to take her own life.
And Doud said, 'I’m sitting there on a Friday night, my ice-cream is melting, and I’m reading this paper and think: My word! for six weeks, this girl has been sitting three feet away from me, and I’ve been more interested in Flannery O’Conner’s southern gothic style and trying to shove it down her throat than I really have been about her."
This experience reconfirmed something for Guy Doud — that there is something more important, more valuable than reading, writing, and arithmetic; something even more important than computer literacy. He teaches human beings! As children of our Heavenly Father, we have a responsibility to affirm our worth. We have a responsibility to resurrect and restore the genuine value in those who see themselves as little more than human trash.
We need someone greater than ourselves — the indwelling presence of God to resurrect us from the graves of guilt in which we bury ourselves. We need that spiritual power to resurrect us from the many ways in which we crucify and condemn ourselves, and diminish our spirits to a state that is less than fully human. Jesus demonstrated the power of God in his resurrection, but he came to resurrect us as well. He came to resurrect value, to rescue us from the garbage heaps on which we sometimes discard ourselves. Jesus became incarnate on our world so that when we are confronted with a personality of such truth, beauty, goodness, and love, we can not help but be lifted up and inspired to a new level of living and loving. Whenever the spirit of Jesus touches someone, they are transformed!
All too often we see ourselves in the same manner as the consumables that we buy. They are disposable-diapers, pens, coffee cups, razors, food containers. We see ourselves as useless, insignificant, worthless, disposable people. Sometimes we bury that which is really good within ourselves. When adversity gets the upper hand and our lives are not going as we have planned, we lose touch with the Master, we lose our sense of value and purpose.
Even when we have fallen into one of life’s deep dark pits, the Spirit of the Master reaches down and lifts us up to a state of dignity once again. The energy of his Spirit restores our sense of value and brings about a transformation of our identity — we know that in God’s view, we are someone very special and that we can make an important difference in the world. In partnership with God we can restore value and dignity where it has been lost! Thanks be to God!
Myra Brooks Welch wrote a marvelous poem, “The Master’s Touch.” that says more eloquently what I have been trying to share with you.
‘Twas battered and scarred, and the auctioneer
Thought it scarcely worth his while
To waste much time on the old violin,
But he held it up with a smile:
“What am I bidden, good folks,” he cried,
“Who’ll start the bidding for me?”
“A dollar, a dollar” then, “Two.” “Only two?”
“Two dollars and who’ll make it three?”
“Three dollars once, three dollars twice:
Going for three, …” but no.
From the room far back, a gray haired man
Came forward and picked up the bow;
Then wiping the dust from the old violin
and tightening the loosened strings,
He played a melody pure and sweet
As a caroling angel sings.
The music ceased, and the auctioneer,
With a voice that was quiet and low,
Said, “What am I bid for the old violin?”
And he held it up with the bow.
“A thousand dollars. And who will make it two?
Two thousand. Who’ll make it three?
Three thousand once, three thousand twice,
And going and gone.” said he.
The people cheered, but some of them cried,
“We do not quite understand.
What changed it’s worth?” Swift came the reply:
“The touch of the Master’s hand.”
And many a man with life out of tune
And battered and scarred with sin,
Is auctioned cheap to the thoughtless crowd,
Much like the old violin.
A “mess of potage, a glass of wine,”
A game-and he travels on.
He is going once and going twice.
He’s going and almost gone!
But the Master comes, and the foolish crowd
Can never quite understand
The worth of a soul and the change that’s wrought
By the touch of the Master’s hand.