Scrubbing Toilets

When I was in my late teens and early 20s, I had a common refrain about my fears of what would happen if I gave God full control in my life (hmmm... there's that control word. Probably another post coming.) The refrain was "I'm afraid if I tell God I'll do anything He wants that I'll end up in some little town scrubbing toilets."

Well, Steubenville has a population of about 18,000, and today I scrubbed my toilet.

I don't suppose it was the scrubbing part, or necessarily the toilet part, or even the small town part that I dreaded. What I was sure of is that if all of these came to pass, I would be miserable. Really, I think what struck me as the worst is that at the time I never would have freely chosen to do those things. I guess what I was trying to say is I feared God would force to do something I didn't want to.

Ok, on second thought, this IS that other post.

God doesn't force people to do things they don't want to do. God doesn't force anything. Even good things, which is really all He has to give, anyway.

What God does, which I completely did not understand during the phase of my life when I feared this, is change us with His grace. He created our nature -- human nature and our own individual soulish composition. Then, He gives us grace. As we receive it, we believe and act upon it. Then He gives us more grace -- that's how we walk down the road with God, so to speak. It's how the journey of faith goes.

It occurred to me the other day at Mass that we go through different stages in our relationship to virtue. We, or at least I, start out thinking virtues are nice things, nice ideas, with not much application to me. Then, virtues are something I try to have. I try to be generous, I try to be zealous. And that lasts maybe a hour or two, and I'm back to real life. Then virtues are things I get bothered about not having. I'm so stingy, I'm so bland. It's only when we get to the scary point of needing a virtue -- being pushed to exercize weak virtue -- that we start getting the point. And for me right now, needing virtue in relationship to my children is the ultimate motivator. The ultimate fear, if you will. When my son was a baby, it was fortitude in advocating for him in his foster care system. But when it is virtue needed in talking with him, in modeling the way I wish for him to live, that is when I am finally on my face, needing virtue. I know I need something that God has to give me, that I can only receive from Him.

I want that virtue because I need that virtue. Without that virtue I will feel a type of failure towards my children I don't want -- the failure to show them Christ.

So I was thinking about authority = service today as my daughter was on the potty, and I said to myself, my that toilet needs a wipe 'round. Because I am in authority over my children, I need to clean that toilet. God commissions me to clean that toilet.

But the difference here is that I see it as a bigger part of the desire for virtue. I went after that toilet with the kind of quiet delight that says "this is God's will for me." Mind you I don't like cleaning the toilet. I'd rather not have to. But because it presented itself as a need, I embraced it. I wasn't miserable. God wasn't forcing me. It's part of the little way God gives me to walk with Him and grow in grace.

I think perhaps the only way we can teach our children to be virtuous is by becoming virtuous ourselves. It isn't easy, because it involves dying to ourselves.