Even me

Les Misérables.

A thief pays the price. His scarred wrists proclaim his past, and the mantra of the righteous rings eternally: Once a thief, always a thief. Once a thief, never trustworthy again. Once a wretch, forever irredeemable.

And with that echoing in his mind, the felon makes the jailkeeper a prophet. He steals again. And as he does, we wonder if the prophecy is not true.  Once a wretch, forever irredeemable. The man of God had offered him shelter, food, safety, love… He had extended generosity. Generosity means little, though, in the eyes of one who believes what this man had been told…

Once a wretch, forever irredeemable.

And so the man called wretched behaved as his title would lead one to expect, and he stole. Again. From one who had given him so much. Many would have declared his fate sealed. Many would have condemned him here. Indeed, the Law did.  But the man of God did not.

The silver? Yes it is mine, he said.. But I have given it to him. The silver he has is his to keep, he said. Oh but wait. He has forgotten the best of all—take these silver candlesticks as well, he said. And pray child, use this silver to become an honest man.

It is not generosity or kindness alone that softened a stony heart. It was mercy. Forgiveness. And then generosity.  It was the cloak offered up once the tunic was forcefully taken. It was the man of God who would rather be without any earthly thing than pass up a chance to speak the Gospel into a man’s life—a man who would rather be wronged than be repaid—a man so concerned about the welfare of another human being that his own rights never even entered into consideration.

That man of God, I think, is the true hero of the story.

But the man of the Law still believed the prophecy.
Once a wretch, always irredeemable.

And so he pursued the wretch, seeking to punish and purify and uphold that which he believed to be holy and true. Such was his right. His responsibility, even.  His duty.

And it consumed him. His bitterness, his inability to believe in the redemption of man, his absolute conviction that the wretch was forever a thief… For passion can be misplaced, and his pulled him down to his end.

The greater message, I think, is that poverty is not all about materialism. We think it is. We act as though to toss a pair of used shoes or some hand-me-down clothes at some poor dirty street kid is significantly alleviating the problem, as if the only thing the wretch needed was food and a place to sleep. Materially, yes. That was all he needed. But man is not merely physical, and neither are his needs. Even the wretch—even the thief—is more.

Yet why did I allow that man
To touch my soul and teach me love?
He treated me like any other
He gave me his trust
He called me brother
My life he claims for God above
Can such things be?
For I had come to hate the world
This world that always hated me

Take an eye for an eye!
Turn your heart into stone!
This is all I have lived for!
This is all I have known!

He told me that I have a soul,
How does he know?
What spirit comes to move my life?
Is there another way to go?

Redemption and her story came not through retribution and restitution, but through a willingness to be wronged and abused, if only for the chance that the thief might come to believe in the existence of his own soul.

And yet, it is just a story.

I have often wondered where the balance is between mercy and justice… forgiveness and accountability… the extension of grace and the enabling of poor behavior. I still don’t have the answer. But if I must be one or the other—the man of the Law or the man of God—I know which side I hope to fall on. For he believed that redemption could find any man, and he was willing to sell his own comfort to give that man a chance.

Even the wretch.

Even the thief.

Even me.