WHEN Mother Teresa of Calcutta went to Washington to establish an outpost for her Sisters of Charity, she saw the ghetto of hunger, crime, drugs, and hopelessness. Those who met with her included the powerbrokers, politicians, and the Press. The meeting went on this way:
A reported asked, “What do you hope to accomplish here?”
The living saint smiled with her eyes aglow in the face of camera lights and then said, “the joy of loving and being loved.”
Another reporter asked, "That takes a lot of money, doesn’t it?"
Mother Teresa shook her head. “No, it takes a lot of sacrifice.”
Her message? Do something ... for someone else... for the unwanted, the sick, the persons with disabilities, the aged, or the heartbroken. No one knew the source of the powers of the living saint. All of us only knew that something extraordinary happened wherever she went, despite the fact that her words sound naive.
Years before Mother Teresa went to the United States, there was an anecdote that told on a brother in the order who complained to her about his superior whose rules, he felt, were interfering with his ministry:
He said, “My vocation is to work for lepers. I want to spend my life for them.”
The saint smiled at him for a moment and then she said, “Brother, your vocation is not to work for the lepers. Your vocation is to belong to Jesus.”
Mother Teresa belonged to Jesus not because she was in love with her cause, noble as her cause is, but because she loved God and was dedicated to living His life, not her own. The name of the game she played was called holiness – a complete surrender of self in obedience to the will and service of God.
In like manner, we, Christians exchanged our self-determination when we asked Jesus to save us. There was no trade in to belong to Jesus. “I’ll give you all my rights if you will give me salvation. Instead, we said, “Jesus forgive me my sins, come into my life and be my Lord and Savior.” Indeed, we received Him, by faith, as our Lord and Savior.
“Jesus is the answer to all our longings. Jesus is the answer to all our needs. Savior. Baptizer. Oh, Great Physician. Oh. Halleluiah! He’s all I need.”