Before making a start, I thought of opening the New Testament, the only book I desire to have here in front of me, in this remote corner of the attic, lit by a single skylight, to which I withdraw whenever I can, in order to escape, as far as possible from all human eyes. My lap serves as a table, and an old trunk as a chair. But, someone will say, ‘Why don’t you write in your cell?’
Our dear Lord has seen fit to deprive me even of a cell, although there are quite a few empty ones in the house. As a matter of fact, the community room that we use for work and recreation would seem more suitable for the fulfillment of His designs; but, just as it is inconvenient for writing during the day, so it is all too conducive to drowsiness at night time. But I am glad and I thank God for the grace of having been born poor, and for living more poorly still for love of him. Dear Lord! That is not at all that I wanted to say. I must return to what God presented to me when I opened the New Testament.
In St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians 2, 5–8, I read as follows; “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God…emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant… He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death.” After reflecting a while, I read also verse 12 and 13 of the same chapter: “with fear and trembling work out your salvation. It is God that works in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will.”
Very well then. I need no more than this: obedience and abandonment to God who works within me. I am truly no more than a poor and miserable instrument which He desires to use, and in a little while, like a painter who casts his now useless brush into the fire so that it may be reduced to ashes, the divine Artist will Himself reduce his now useless instrument to the ashes of the tomb, until the great day of the eternal Alleluias. And I ardently desire that day, for the tomb does not annihilate everything, and the happiness of eternal and infinite love begins—now!