The Book of Margery Kempe Book I, Chapters 86-89 Summary

Chapter 86

Jesus reminds Kempe that she will be rewarded in heaven for both her holy deeds and her holy thoughts. It's a pretty sweet deal.
Jesus thanks Kempe for allowing him into those thoughts and into her soul—not just anyone would do such a thing.
Jesus says that whenever Kempe calls a holy person into her soul—like Mary Magdalene or St. Catherine—those saints prepare her soul to receive him there.
Jesus acknowledges some of Kempe's meditative practices, like imagining that she has three cushions in her soul to welcome each person of the Trinity, and he also acknowledges her thoughts.
In the next passage, Jesus basically confirms that Kempe's religious beliefs are totally orthodox—there's no heretical hocus-pocus going on in her soul.
Jesus assures Kempe that he hears her prayers and sees her good works, and he tells her that she is right to pray to him with confidence.
Kempe should, Jesus says, be happy to receive his grace (i.e., all those tears and all that sobbing), because he is proud of her. He thinks of Kempe as his own spouse.
Jesus ends by telling Kempe that whatever good she has done to any person on earth she has done for him. She will be rewarded in heaven.

Kempe tells us that these spiritual visitations and revelations have been going on for 25 years (by the time she starts "writing" her book), with very few interruptions.
Whenever Kempe fell ill, she had visits from the saints to cheer her in her recovery.
Kempe tells us a little about her contemplative method: she prays for five or six hours together, without even noticing that time has been passing. And she loves every minute of it—even her weeping.
In fact, Kempe prays to God that she never stop mourning while she's on earth, because she knows her joy will be sweeter in heaven for all her tears.

Kempe shares a little bit about the "publication history" of her book. She drops her prayers for a bit to speed up the writing of the book, working very closely with the man writing it down.
God tells Kempe it's okay to skip out of praying for a while, since the writing of the book is important prayerful work itself.
God tells Kempe that the best prayers are the ones said in the heart or in thoughts, rather than the more formal prayers said in church.
God renews his promise to Kempe that she will have her confessor, Robert Spryngolde, in heaven with her in the end.
God emphasizes that Kempe does best when she sits still and thinks rather than when she is busy and more engaged with the world. But it's all good, he says: prayer is prayer.
It's really important to God that Kempe understand the love he has for her. He tells her that she pleases him when she believes in his love.
God's especially happy when Kempe holds nothing of her heart back from him. When she does that, he's ready to give all of himself to her as well.

You've finally made it—the end of the book.
Okay, it's the end of Book I. Only ten more chapters to go, though.
Kempe wraps it up by reminding us that she cried A LOT during the writing of this bit of the book, because she had so many holy thoughts in the process.
And Kempe's crying was contagious: the man writing down her life couldn't keep himself from weeping sometimes as well.
There were other obstacles to the writing, including illness. Kempe also explains that she was often afraid of telling or recording her revelations, because they were often hard to interpret.
And interpretation was tricky, because Kempe feared the Devil was misleading her (through delusions), and because sometimes she tried to understand her visions too literally.
In the end, Kempe tells us that the man who wrote the first version of this book (as it finishes at this point) has died.
Kempe also explains that the guy didn't do a great job of it—his spelling and way of writing were atrocious—but that he got enough of the truth down for a good copy to be made.