The Great Gospel of John
Volume 8
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord and His adversaries
- Chapter 95 -
About the power of what is small.
While Marcus was praising Me like that because I gave him this explanation, I said to him: "You have well spoken now with your praise and have given My heart a real and true joy, for he who does not honor that which seems to be small, is also not worthy of that which is greater. But I say to all of you that I am always doing it as you can see in the whole nature of the Earth. When I seem to be doing something great, the effect is less for very wise reasons, but when I seem to be doing something that is hardly noticeable, the result is always endlessly great and indestructible. Therefore, you could say that I am small in that which is great, but endlessly great in that which is very small.
2
When I let terrible destructive storms together with thunder pass over the countries and seas, people say: 'How terribly dreadful You are, o Lord'. But when I put an insignificant grain of seed into the soil, which further germinates, grows and, tiny as it is, causes a strong mighty tree to develop, no human being will exclaim full of amazement: 'How great and mighty are You, o Lord', but he considers this much greater wonder with a very indifferent mind, and he says at most: 'Yes, yes, that must indeed be all so, that according to the will of the Lord greater trees and forests originate from small seeds.'
3
So are men also amazed about very high mountains, wide rivers, big lakes and seas, and they hardly pay attention to a fertile hill and a fertile source that quenches their thirst, but with Me the fertile hill means more than the infertile Ararat, and the pure source means more than the ocean. For these are already closely related to the life out of Me, but the Ararat and the ocean are still very deep in judgment and are still far from life.
4
Therefore, pay also attention to My often seemingly unimportant words, for precisely in these words I give you more of the life of love out of Me than when I would precisely divide before your eyes and ears a whole shell globe into atoms. Because from My endless wisdom and might you can only drink a few drops but from the source of life of My fatherly love you can always take up streams.
5
And look, it is precisely the same when people love, honor and praise Me. Whoever loves Me and praises Me quietly and besides that, in all humility confesses his littleness and My all, honors Me really entirely in the spirit and in truth, and I am well pleased with him, and whatever seems to be so little has great consequences. However, he who honors and praises Me with worldly splendor, with all kinds of meaningless ceremonies and long prayers and songs and besides that believes that he is pleasing Me, is seriously mistaken, because such praise is an abomination in My eyes when it comes from priests, and when the unknowing people thinks to honor Me with this and wants to ask My mercy with it, it will mostly not be answered by Me, so that they will come to know that such great and showy prayers and worship are absolutely not pleasing Me.
6
People who worship, praise and honor Me with splendor will receive as many fruits of mercy as there are feeding fruits growing on high mountain peaks. For he who does not pray to Me in the spirit and in all truth in his heart, will also not be answered, for if I would answer your prayers, I Myself would support the lie and paganism, which no one who has somehow a little intellect will ever expect from Me, for I am Myself the Light, the Way, the Truth and the Life. Then how could I like darkness, the wrong paths, the lie and death?
7
Therefore, I also say to you that I neither pass by in the blast of the storm, nor in the raging of the fire, but in the soft rustling of the blowing morning air. So he who will go to meet Me in such a quietness of his mind, will also meet Me."
8
Now Marcus said: "O lord and Master, how great and lovely, how full of love and eternally true are Your words, and how happy is the one who understands them and acts according to their spirit. But how few are those who want to hear it and take it to heart. We however, will do what You have advised us to do, for we know and believe now really that You alone are the Lord and Master, You alone the One and true God of eternity, and that everything that exists in the infinity has been created and is sustained all along by You. Therefore also, You only be all glory, all praise and all our actual love and worship.
9
But since we now have already here the indescribable happiness to have You lively as the eternal Master of all things among us, it would really be unforgivable when we Romans who are eager to learn would not address ourselves to You with still all kinds of questions, for You only can tell us how things are concerning this and that. And so I have at this opportunity still a little question."