Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things.
When Paul wrote that, he was in jail. I imagine that it’s pretty hard to dwell on the true and the noble and the lovely and all that from a jail cell. A few verses later he writes something even harder to believe: “I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.” In my family, we still tease my youngest sister Emily for a self-serving line she came up with in order to impress our parents: at about five years old, while we older kids were complaining about something, she said, “I’m just happy for what I’ve got.” And at Clare’s school, they use a little rhyme to teach the kids Paul’s secret of contentment: “you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit.” But I think Paul’s talking about something that goes beyond toddler stoicism, and I think the secret is in the connection to the earlier verse—whatever the circumstances, whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy, dwell on these things. I guess Paul was successfully experimenting with epiphany.
For some maybe this comes easy.
A couple of years ago, Casey–or was it the Feminarian?–turned me on to a lovely blog called “Three Beautiful Things,” by a woman named Clare in London. The point of the blog is simple: Clare makes note of three beautiful things she’s noticed throughout the day. And that’s it.
Saturday’s list was, a haircut, some crazy online game about London and the acoustics of her kitchen. Friday’s list was rain, chocolates, and a pepper.
But that doesn’t capture it. Listen to this: “…a beautiful red pepper. It is shaped like the nose of a Venetian mask, and its glossy skin shades between red and green. I look at the places between the colours and try to understand where the red ends and the green begins.”
This woman had an epiphany looking at a pepper! I think she’s someone maybe we could learn from.
So today, we’re going to practice this spiritual discipline of “seeing the good,” and we’re going to borrow Clare’s strategy of 3BT.
I want to begin by asking you to think about, and write down, three beautiful things from this last decade.
Then 3BT from this past year.
And 3BT from this past week.
And 3BT for today.
We’ll share what we want to share, and keep what’s too precious for speaking aloud to ourselves. Don’t strain yourself; don’t hold yourself to the poetic standard of Clare’s 3BT lists; and don’t worry if (gasp!) you find yourself short of 3 for some reason. But try. And when you’re done, look at your lists, and see the good.
