From An Old Monk

                                             From An Old Monk

I'm reading a great book: "On Loving God" by Bernard of Clairvaux, who lived about 900 years ago.

We often think of those ancient saints as being rigid and austere. And we are often wrong. He is loving and joyous in his faith and  displays that in his writing.

He also wrote one of my favorite hymns: "Jesus, the Very Thought of Thee."

Here are some of the lines:

   Jesus, the very thought of Thee, with sweetness fills my breast.
   But sweeter  still Thy face to see, and in Thy presence rest.

   O hope of every contrite heart, O joy of all the meek
   To those who fall how kind Thou art, how good to all who seek!

   But what of those who find? Ah, this no pen or tongue can show
   The love of Jesus,  what it is, none but His loved ones know!

Sort of reminds me of a more modern hymn, "And He walks
with me and He talks with me, and He tells me I am His own...
And the joy we share  as we tarry there, none other has ever known."