17. The most significant person is precisely the one sitting across from you right now.

The most important hour is always the present. The most significant person is precisely the one sitting across from you right now. The most necessary work is always love.” ~ Meister Eckhart
Talk about another principle for good living. Here are three inalienable statements of fact. Now is always the most important time. As discussed in earlier days, now is the time we can influence. We are taught what to do – turn toward God, seek God, be with God, honor God, do as God would have do. The last hour is too late and the next hour is not here yet and the barriers that could rise up between now and then are uncountable and unpredictable. Choose now, just as I chose this instant to reflect on Eckhart in the hopes he would lead me to seek God.

The most significant person is the one sitting across from you now. Most of the time that would be my wife. That is how it should be. She is the most important person in life. No one else is close. My children are of vital importance and from them importance radiates out to the rest of my family and from there to my friends.

That is not what Eckhart is referring to, however, the most important person over all is not the most important person at any given moment. When I am with a friend who is pain, the person is deserving and entitled to everything I have to offer. The same is true of any patient I call on as a chaplain or family member who has my attention. Each person is a creation of God and is just beautiful and worthy as I am. I should expect the same focus and attention in return and often I feel little jealous if I don’t get it. That is another question to be discussed another time. The question to focus on now is the person across from me. After all, doesn’t God offer us his love in the same fashion? There is no way to even begin to question how God can do that but, after all, he is God and that is what God is all about.

The most important work is Love. Yup. No doubt that is the truest of statements. Our pursuit of God, everything we have considered thus far in our 17 days of reflection points to that fact. It is all about love. Always.

I make a point of telling men and women I love them simply because I wish to love as God loves. There is no issue beyond the love God has for us that brought him to offer us his son, the love he asks of us and the greatest commandment he has given us. We are to love one another as love ourselves. The most important work is love.