September 23, 2026

Not What You Have Been

For it is not what thou art, nor what thou hast been, that God looks at with His merciful eyes, but that which thou wouldst be.

Written by an unknown fourteenth-century English monk, likely a Carthusian, as private instruction for a young student learning contemplative prayer. The author had spent years stripping away pride, learned opinions, and self-image to reach a plainer kind of love for God. This line reassures the student that God does not measure a soul by its record of successes and sins but by its present longing. It speaks directly to anyone caught up in curated identity today, suggesting that who you are becoming matters more than who you have been or appeared to be.