Revelations of Divine Love

by Julian of Norwich

  He could not die any more, but he would not stop working. So next he had to feed us, for a mother’s dear love has made him our debtor. The mother can give her child her milk to suck, but our dear mother Jesus can feed us with himself, and he does so most generously and most tenderly with the holy sacrament which is the precious food of life itself. And with all the sweet sacraments he sustains us most mercifully and most graciously. And this is what he meant in those blessed words when he said, ‘It is I that Holy Church preaches and teaches to you’;55 that is to say, ‘All the health and life of the sacraments, all the power and grace of my word, all the goodness which is ordained in Holy Church for you, it is I.’

  The mother can lay the child tenderly to her breast, but our tender mother Jesus, he can familiarly lead us into his blessed breast through his sweet open side, and show within part of the Godhead and the joys of heaven, with spiritual certainty of endless bliss; and that was shown in the tenth revelation, giving the same understanding in the sweet words where he says, ‘Look how I love you’, looking into his side and rejoicing. This fair, lovely word ‘mother’, it is so sweet and so tender in itself that it cannot truly be said of any but of him, and of her who is the true mother of him and of everyone. To the nature of motherhood belong tender love, wisdom and knowledge, and it is good, for although the birth of our body is only low, humble and modest compared with the birth of our soul, yet it is he who does it in the beings by whom it is done. The kind, loving mother who knows and recognizes the need of her child, she watches over it most tenderly, as the nature and condition of motherhood demands. And as it grows in age her actions change, although her love does not. And as it grows older still, she allows it to be beaten to break down vices so that the child may gain in virtue and grace. These actions, with all that is fair and good, our Lord performs them through those by whom they are done. Thus he is our natural mother through the work of grace in the lower part, for love of the higher part. And he wants us to know it; for he wants all our love to be bound to him. And in this I saw that all the debt we owe, at God’s bidding, for his fatherhood and motherhood, is fulfilled by loving God truly; a blessed love which Christ arouses in us. And this was shown in everything, and especially in the great, generous words where he says, ‘It is I that you love.’

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  Jesus behaves more tenderly in giving us spiritual birth; though he allows us to fall so that we may recognize our sinfulness, he quickly raises us, not withdrawing his love because of our transgression, for he cannot allow his child to perish; he wants us to have the nature of a child, always rushing to him in our need.

  And in our spiritual birth he behaves with incomparably more tenderness, in as much as our soul is of greater value in his eyes. He fires our understanding, he directs our ways, he eases our conscience, he comforts our soul, he enlightens our heart and gives us some degree of knowledge and love of his blessed Godhead, with awareness through grace of his precious Manhood and his blessed Passion, and with courteous wonder at his great and surpassing goodness; and he makes us love all that he loves, for his love’s sake, and makes us take pleasure in him and all his works. If we fall, he quickly raises us by calling us tenderly and touching us with grace. And when we have been strengthened like this by his dear actions, then we choose him willingly, through his precious grace, we choose to serve him and to love him for ever and ever. And after this he allows some of us to fall harder and more painfully than we ever did before, or so it seems to us. And those of us who are not very wise think that all our earlier effort has gone for nothing. But it is not so; for we need to fall, and we need to be aware of it; for if we did not fall, we should not know how weak and wretched we are of ourselves, nor should we know our Maker’s marvellous love so fully; for in heaven we shall see truly and everlastingly that we have sinned grievously in this life, and we shall see that in spite of this his love for us remained unharmed, and we were never less valuable to him. And by experiencing this failure, we shall gain a great and marvellous knowledge of love in God for all eternity; for that love which cannot and will not be broken by sin is strong and marvellous. And this is one aspect of the benefit we gain. Another is the humility and gentleness we shall gain from seeing our fall; for by this we shall be raised up high in heaven, a rise which we might never have known without that humility. And therefore we need to see it, and if we do not see it, though we should fall, it would not profit us. Usually, we fall first, then we see it, and both through the mercy of God. The mother may allow the child to fall sometimes and to be hurt for its own benefit, but her love does not allow the child ever to be in any real danger. And though our earthly mother may allow her child to perish, our heavenly mother Jesus cannot allow us who are his children to perish; for he and none but he is almighty, all wisdom and all love. Blessed may he be!

  But often when our falling and our wretched sin is shown to us, we are so terrified and so very ashamed that we hardly know where to put ourselves. But then our kind Mother does not want us to run from him, there is nothing he wants less. But he wants us to behave like a child; for when it is hurt or frightened it runs to its mother for help as fast as it can; and he wants us to do the same, like a humble child, saying, ‘My kind Mother, my gracious Mother, my dearest Mother, take pity on me. I have made myself dirty and unlike you and I neither may nor can remedy this without your special help and grace.’ And if we do not feel that we are immediately given help, we can be sure that he is behaving like a wise mother, for if he sees that it would be more beneficial for us to grieve and weep, with sorrow and pity he allows it to continue until the right moment, and all for love. So then he wants us to take on the nature of a child which always naturally trusts the love of its mother in weal and woe.

  And he wants us to cling strongly to the faith of Holy Church and find our dearest Mother there in the comfort of true understanding with the whole blessed community; for a single person may often feel broken, but the whole body of Holy Church has never been broken, nor ever shall be, for all eternity. And therefore it is a safe, good and gracious thing to wish humbly and strongly to be supported by and united to our mother, Holy Church, that is Christ Jesus; for there is plenty of the food of mercy which is his dearest blood and precious water to make us clean and pure. The blessed wounds of our Saviour are open and rejoice to heal us; the sweet, gracious hands of our Mother are ready and carefully surround us; for in all this he does the work of a kind nurse who has nothing to do but occupy herself with the salvation of her child. His task is to save us, and it is his glory to do so, and it is his wish that we know it; for he wants us to love him tenderly, and trust him humbly and strongly. And he showed this in these gracious words, ‘I hold you quite safely.’

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  The love of God never allows his chosen to lose their time, for all their trouble is turned into eternal joy; and how we all have God to thank for his kind56 nature and for his grace; for there is every kind of nature in man and we do not need to seek out various kinds, just turn to Holy Church.

  For at that time he showed our frailty and our fallings, our discouragements, our abasements, our humiliations and our outcastings; all the woe which it seemed to me could possibly befall us in this life. And with this he showed his blessed power, his blessed wisdom, his blessed love, in which he protects us at such times as tenderly and as sweetly for his own glory and as safely for our salvation as he does when we enjoy most pleasure and comfort; and with this he raises us in spirit right up to heaven, and turns everything to his glory and our joy everlastingly; for his love never allows our time to be lost. And all this comes from the natural kindly goodness of God through the operation of grace. God in his essence is kindly nature; that is to say, the goodness that is kind and natural is God. He is the ground, he is the substance, he is kind nature itself and he is true father and true mother of nature. And all the kinds of nature which he has caused to flow out of him to work his will shall be restored and brought within him again by the salvation of man through the w
ork of grace; for of the many kinds of nature with which he has respectively invested various creatures, man is invested with all, in fullness, in beauty, and in goodness, in royalty and nobility, in every kind of glorious excellence. Here we can see that we are all joined to God by kindly nature and joined to God by grace. Here we can see that we do not need to search far and wide to know various kinds of nature, but seek them in Holy Church, in our mother’s breast; that is to say, in our own soul, where our Lord lives. And there we shall find everything; find it now in faith and in understanding, and later find it truly in himself and brightly in bliss.

  But let no man or woman apply this to themselves alone; it is not personal, but general, for it is our precious Christ, and this fair nature was ordained for him, for the glory and nobility of man’s making, and for the joy and bliss of man’s salvation; just as he had seen, known and recognized since before time began.

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  Sin causes more suffering than hell, and is vile and hurts nature, but grace saves nature and destroys sin; the children of Jesus are not yet all born, and never grow beyond childhood, living in feebleness until they come to heaven where joys are always beginning again for all eternity.

  Here we can see that to hate sin comes to us truly by nature and to hate sin comes to us truly by grace; for nature is all good and fair of itself and grace was sent out to save nature and destroy sin and bring fair kind nature back to the blessed point from which it came, that is God, with greater nobility and glory through the virtuous work of grace; for it shall be seen before God by all his holy ones in eternal joy that nature has been tried in the fire of tribulation and no lack or fault has been found there. So nature and grace are in harmony, for grace is God as nature is God. He is double in his way of working and single in love, and neither of them works without the other, nor can they be separated. And when through God’s mercy and with his help we put ourselves into harmony with nature and grace, we shall truly see that sin is much more vile and painful than hell, without comparison, for it is contrary to our fair nature; for as truly as sin is unclean, so is it truly unnatural, and therefore appears a horrible thing to the loved soul that wants to be all fair and shining in the eyes of God as nature and grace teach us.

  But let us not be afraid of this except in so far as fear can help us, but let us humbly lament to our dearest Mother, and he will sprinkle us all over with his precious blood and make our soul very soft and tender, and in the course of time he will heal us completely, just as is most honourable for him and most joyful for us eternally. And he will never pause nor cease in this good, tender work until all his dearest children have been born and delivered. And he showed this where he showed how spiritual thirst was to be understood, that is the love-longing which will last until Judgement Day.

  So our life is grounded in our true mother, Jesus, in his own foreseeing wisdom since before time began, with the great power of the Father, and the great and supreme goodness of the Holy Ghost. And in taking on our human nature he gave us life, in his blessed death on the cross he gave us birth into life everlasting; and from that time, and now, and for ever until Judgement Day, he feeds and fosters us, just as the great and supreme kind nature of motherhood and the natural need of childhood demand. To the eyes of our soul, our heavenly Mother is good and tender; to the eyes of our heavenly Mother the children of grace are precious and lovely, with humility and gentleness and all the fair virtues which belong to children by nature; for naturally the child does not despair of the mother’s love; naturally the child does not set itself up presumptuously; naturally the child loves the mother and each one loves the other; these are the fair virtues, with all others that are like them, with which our heavenly Mother is honoured and pleased. And I understood that in this life no one grows beyond childhood, in feebleness and inadequacy of body and mind, until the time when our gracious Mother has brought us up into our Father’s bliss. And then we shall really understand what he means in these sweet words where he says, ‘All shall be well, and you shall see for yourself that all manner of things shall be well.’57 And then the bliss of our motherhood in Christ will begin again in the joys of our God; a new beginning which will last without end, always beginning again.

  So I understood that all his blessed children who come from him by nature shall be bought back into him by grace.

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  The fifteenth revelation as it was shown: the absence of God in this life is our very great sorrow, besides other sufferings, but we shall suddenly be taken from all suffering, with Jesus for our mother; and God is very pleased if we wait patiently, and God wants us to take our pain lightly, for love, and thinking ourselves always near to the moment of delivery.

  Before this time I had a great longing and desire that as a gift from God I should be delivered from this world and this life; for I often considered the grief which is here and the well-being and bliss which is existence there. And even if there had been no sorrow in this life except for the absence of our Lord, I sometimes thought it more than I could bear, and this made me grieve and earnestly yearn, and so did my own sinfulness, sloth and weakness, so that it did not please me to live and suffer, as it was my lot to do. And our kind Lord answered all this to bring me comfort and patience, and said these words, ‘You shall suddenly be taken from all your suffering, from all your sickness, from all this pain and from all the woe. And you shall come up above, and you shall have me as your reward, and you shall be filled with love and bliss. And you shall have no kind of suffering, no kind of displeasure, no unfulfilled desires, but always joy and bliss without end. Why should you fret about suffering for a while, since it is my will and my glory?’ And at these words, ‘You shall suddenly be taken’, I saw that God rewards man for the patience he shows in awaiting God’s will, and for his time, and I saw that man’s patience extends throughout the time he has to live, because he does not know the time of his passing. This is a great gain, for if a man knew his time, he would not have patience over that time. And according to God’s will, while the soul is in the body it seems to itself that it is always about to die, for all this life and this distress which we have here is only a moment, and when we are suddenly taken from suffering into bliss, then the suffering will be nothing.

  And at this time I saw a body lying on the earth, a body which looked dismal and ugly, without shape or form as if it were a swollen and heaving mass of stinking mire. And suddenly out of this body there sprang a very beautiful creature, a little child perfectly shaped and formed, quick and bright, whiter than a lily, which glided swiftly up into heaven. And the swelling of the body represents the great sinfulness of our mortal flesh and the smallness of the child represents the chaste purity of the soul. And I thought, ‘None of the beauty of this child remains with the body, nor does any of this body’s filth cling to the child.’

  It is more blessed for man to be taken from suffering than for suffering to be taken from man; for if pain is taken from us it may return. Therefore it is a supreme comfort and blessed insight for a loving soul that we shall be taken from pain; for in this promise I saw the marvellous compassion which our Lord has for us in our woe and his kind promise of complete deliverance; for he wants us to be comforted by this transcendence; and he showed that in these words: ‘And you shall come up above, and you shall have me as your reward, and you shall be filled with joy58 and bliss.’ It is God’s will that we should focus our thoughts on this blessed insight as often as we can and for as long as possible, through his grace. For this contemplation is blessed to the soul that is led by God, and greatly to his glory for the time that it lasts. If through our own frailty we fall back into our sorrow and spiritual blindness and feelings of spiritual and physical pain, it is God’s will that we know that he has not forgotten us. And that is what he means in these words which he says to comfort us: ‘And you shall have no more suffering, no kind of sickness, no kind of displeasure, no unfulfilled desires, but always joy and bliss without end. Why should you fret about suffering for a whil
e, since it is my will and my glory?’59 It is God’s will that we accept his promises and his comfort in as broad and strong a sense as we can take them. And he also wants us to take our waiting and our distress as lightly as we can and to consider them nothing; for the more lightly we take them and the less importance we give them for love, the less we shall suffer from feeling them and the more thanks and reward we shall have for them.

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  He who chooses God for love, with reverent humility, is sure to be saved; this reverent humility sees the Lord as marvellously great and the self as marvellously small; and God does not want us to fear anything but him, for the power of our Enemy is committed into the hand of our Friend, so everything that God does shall please us greatly.

  And so I understood that the people who in this life willingly choose God for love, may be sure they will be loved eternally, and it is this eternal love that works this grace in them, for he wants us to believe without doubt that we may all hope securely for the bliss of heaven while we are here, as we shall enjoy it securely when we are there. And it was shown that the more pleasure and joy we take in this security, with reverence and humility, the more it pleases him. This reverence that I have in mind is a holy, respectful fear of our Lord, which is joined to humility: and that means that one sees the Lord as marvellously great, and the self as marvellously small; for these virtues belong for ever to those who are loved by God; and may even now be seen and felt to some extent through the gracious presence of our Lord when he is with us; a presence which is of all things the most desired, for it brings marvellous security, by true faith and sure hope through great love, and by fear which is sweet and delightful.