So I took the little scroll from the hand of the angel and ate it; it was sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it, my stomach was made bitter.
In the midst of the trumpets, the hairy locusts with breastplates of armor, and the people with fire coming out of their mouths is this sentence. It was only the accompanying reflection of Bernard of Clairvaux that made me notice, and read it as anything other than a man taking a little bit of tasty paper, eating it, and then getting a stomach ache.
Clairvaux writes about what happens when we look closely at ourselves and how we’ve lived. He suggests that sin – all of the things we do and say that we know are not of God – might momentarily taste or feel good. But soon we get a stomach ache, when considering what we’ve done.
This I understand, both figuratively and literally. That second piece of desert – tasted good and gave me a belly ache. The gossip or unkind words might feel good as they are initially said, but leave me feeling bad. With some things, I’ve learned – but they tend to be very literal stomach aches, so I know not to overload on certain foods.
But why is it so hard to remember the other things that we do that result in figurative stomach aches? There are things that I do that I know will result in me not feeling good, and yet I persist.
Clairvaux continues that when we examine ourselves, that’s when we acknowledge the unpleasant but lingering aftereffects of our bad behavior. That’s probably why we’re loathe to conduct these self-reflections; they uncover all sorts of things we’ve done or left undone that leave us feeling bad. But we must, if we have any hope of not doing the same bad things over and over. This morning, I’m thinking about how I might spend time in self-reflection to help me identify the things I shouldn’t have done in the first place. Hopefully someday I’ll learn to stop doing them in the first place.
Amen…and if only.
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