Spiritual Roses from Story of a Soul - Jesus' Little Paint Brush

Welcome to my series featuring excerpts from the book that started it all - Story of a Soul. I'm calling the series Spiritual Roses from Story of a Soul and I hope that you will visit here every day for an inspirational message from our dear little saint.

"...Ah! how true it is that God alone knows human hearts and that creatures are terribly narrow in their thoughts! When they see a soul more enlightened than others, immediately they conclude that Jesus loves them less than this soul, and that they cannot be called to the same perfection. Since when has the Lord no longer the right to make use of one of His creatures to dispense necessary nourishment to souls whom He loves? The Lord, even at the time of the Pharoahs, had this right, for in Scripture He says to this monarch: 'And therefore have I raised you, that I may show MY POWER in you, and my name may be spoken of throughout all the earth.' Century has followed on century since the Most High has spoken those words, and since then His conduct has undergone no change, for He is always using His creatures as instruments to carry on His work in souls.

If a piece of canvas painted on by an artist could think and speak, it certainly would not complain at being constantly touched and retouched by the brush, and would not envy the lot of that instrument, for it would realize it was not to the brush but to the artist using it that it owed the beauty with which it was clothed. The brush, too, would not be able to boast of the masterpiece produced with it, as it knows that artists are not at a loss, they play with difficulties, and are pleased to choose at times weak and defective instruments.

My dear Mother, I am a little brush that Jesus has chosen in order to paint His own image in the souls you entrusted to my care. An artist does not use only one brush, but needs at least two; the first is the more useful and with it he applies the general tints and covers the canvas entirely in a very short time; the other, the smaller one, he uses for details.

Mother, you are the precious brush that the hand of Jesus lovingly holds when He wishes to do a great work in the souls of your children, and I am the very small brush He deigns to use afterward for the smallest details..."

Excerpted from Story of a Soul, ICS Publications, Third Edition, page 190. This book and many others along with a line of holy cards and photos of St. Therese imported from her monastery in Lisieux can be found at my webstore The Little Way.

St. Therese, open our hearts to your little way. Teach us to throw ourselves into the arms of Our Lord, casting away all doubt and fear and accepting all that He sends us as graces for the salvation of our souls.