Came across this quote from Pensées by Blaise Pascal and it struck me how very true it is.
Knowing God without knowing our own wretchedness makes for pride. Knowing our own wretchedness without knowing God makes for despair.
Knowing Jesus Christ strikes the balance because He shows us both God and our own wretchedness. Jesus is a God whom we can approach without pride and before whom we can humble ourselves without despair.
We alternate back and forth between awareness of our own failings and pride, don’t we? I think about the PathLight students growing into maturity (and all youth for that matter) and how difficult this insight is for them to understand. They are identifying who they are as people — the way all adolescents do — and it’s difficult to know who, at our core, we really are.
Like so many things in life, it’s about balance. It’s about the tension we live in. The constant pull and push of life forces around us. My book is going to be about that — though focused on the tension between wealth and poverty.
Anyway, this quote made me think (an unusual occurrence) and I thought it was worth sharing.
