There's An Old Fable About A Miserable Rich Man ...

There’s an old fable about a miserable rich man who went to visit a rabbi. The rabbi took the rich man by the hand and led him to a window.

"Look out there," he said. The rich man looked into the street. "What do you see?" asked the rabbi.

"I see men, women, and children," answered the rich man.

Again the rabbi took him by the hand and this time led him to a mirror. "Now what do you see?"

"Now I see myself," the rich man replied.

Then the rabbi said, "Behold, in the window there is glass, and in the mirror there is glass. But the glass of the mirror is covered with a little silver, and no sooner is the silver added than you cease to see others, but you see only yourself.”

When we start to look at our silver, our possessions, we stop seeing others, and we also stop seeing God. We can only see ourselves.

From Paul Decker’s Sermon: What a Way To Go!