Monday, November 12, 2018

A Christmas Story




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Men decided
They could improve
 upon The Manger

 A chandelier here
Some red carpet there
 Custom carved pews and podiums...

 Layer upon layer replaced "Line upon line..."
 Though more is just more
They persisted
Reducing posterity and Providence
Into princess and the pea
The essence buried 
Under stacks of superfluous nonsense 

And once again
In tragic irony 
The Sovereign Ruler 
Finds no room at the inn

Deity displaced
Emmanuel eclipsed
 A baby's cry 
Barely heard
On a Bethlehem night...

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"For unto us a child is born,
Unto us a son is given..."
-Isaiah 9:6

Monday, October 15, 2018

Rare bird...




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Seven years ago
A friend saw these wings
On the bark of a seven times seven
Year old tree...

Seven years later
Their re-emerging 
Graced me with the harbinger blessing
Of fleeting things, 
Of encounters with the Elusive,
Prized precisely because 
of their ephemeral nature
Treasured for their rarity...

Whether once in a lifetime
Or once every seven years,
How Precious are the wings we are given,
In whatever form they come...

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"He who holds to himself a joy
Doth the winged life destroy,
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sunrise."
-William Blake

Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Echo




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Lovely Echoes
Of Long Gone Lovely Seasons
Bitter Sweet Beauty
Gilding amber branches
And prophetic falling leaves

Once-Upon-A-Times
Linger golden with last light
The aurous encore
Before their flight

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"To everything there is a season,
And a time for every matter under heaven."
Ecclesiastes 3:1

Thursday, July 26, 2018

Interlude



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The Tristan Chord of our lives
In tremulous tension

Craving,
Reaching,
 Longing for resolution,

Rest

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"For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come."
-Habakkuk 2:3

Thursday, June 28, 2018

Bathwater




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Religion is the ultimate counterfeit of God

 Seemingly innocuous
Sometimes attractive
But always a Trap

Selling the tasty treat of Belonging
Which our Souls so crave
Which is meant to be found in God
Not rituals and regulations
It is a sideline
A deadly detour
Derailing us
Distracting us
From
Deity

Well meaning atheists
and waylayed agnostics
were right to reject 
this ersatz nonsense,
In their intelligence they saw it
for what it was
Failing only to compartmentalize
the counterfeit from the Creator

Thus the Baby
Born in the manger
Got thrown out
with the 
Bathwater
Leaving
Otherwise
Wise men
Defrauded

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Counterfeit--made in exact imitation of something valuable or important with the intention to deceive or defraud.

Saturday, June 2, 2018

One Thing


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See me
 Scraping and clawing at your word 
Trying desperately to find the metaphor 
Which makes sense 
of my existence...

 My failings,
 My agonizing misses
 My utter lack of character
 My Self 

It is here
 In the middle of this crazed kerfuffle
And not in some pious white washed prayer time
You meet me
You gently take my chin
You reel my gaze back in to meet Yours
And to look
Instead

For You

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"One thing is needed..."
Luke 42:10, 12

Monday, May 21, 2018

Prisoner's Paradox




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We write
Like Paul
Out of our own imprisonment
Which 
In the end
Is what makes others
Free

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"The spirit of the Lord is upon me...to proclaim freedom to the captives."
-Luke 4:18

Sunday, May 20, 2018

Saved




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I am the woman at the well
I am Mary
 I am the one caught red-handed, 
The Pharisee in me poised with stones,
Saved by Grace alone 
By The God Who Sees
 And loves anyway

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"I have loved you with an everlasting love."
-Jeremiah 31:3

Saturday, May 19, 2018

Gambler




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We all play our cards
As best we can
All we're made up of,
For better and worse,
Informing each move

We sometimes play cards we desperately wish we hadn't
We despair at the cards
We did not play instead
Our hindsight a merciless taskmaster
Keeping us fettered to the futility of regret

It is not a new hand we need
 or even a new game,
But faith in The Dealer Who still holds an ace up His sleeve 
Faith in the fact,
 that when all is said and done,
 It is His hand which will play out,
His hand, which so tenderly holds us,
which also holds all the cards
And in the end,

Wins.

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"I am the Alpha and the Omega
The beginning and the end,
The first and the last,
I am He."

Revelation 22:13

Sunday, April 1, 2018

Third Day



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A pensive stillness
As the crowds
Which had dissipated
Stopped
And
Turned...

... There was movement
They saw it
Unmistakable

The body thought dead
Was Alive

What was that?
Another movement
A Breath
They were sure if it

The dead was being raised,
Back to Life

The Breath Giver
Held her in His Arms
Resuscitating
Reanimating
Determined in His Purpose...

...She 

Would

 Live...

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"I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for peace and not evil, to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
-Jeremiah 29:11

Thursday, February 22, 2018

Wings 101



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The wisdom of winged things

Their flight
Their smallness
Their delicate strength

Their Simplicity in the Scheme of Things

No wonder His eye is on the sparrow...

...We would do well to follow His lead...

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Matthew 10:29

Jonah's Prayer



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Caught between
Sun
and
Storm

This pause
This middle
This nothing

Throw me overboard
Off this ship

Swallow me
Swim me
Spit me
Out

Onto the Shore
Of forty second
Second Chances

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Hosea 2:15

Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Second Day



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The crowd had dissipated
With the disciples hopes
Thousands of had-been believers
Up in smoke
The overflowing stadium emptied
The over-rated throngs withdrew
The jig was up
Game Over...

... Thus Began
The eternal three days,
As most Real stories do,
In Ashes

And in the Still Small Voice of the second day,
In that comparative silence,
Destiny had been decided
Despite appearances

For Beauty was brewing
About to bloom and burst forth
Unbeknownst to any
Unwitnessed by any
Save one...

... The Summit of Time
The Sublime Moment
Would not be seen by millions
But by Mary,
A hooker turned fisher of men
(Gotta love God's sense of irony,
Redemption in a nutshell right there)
God would wait
Till the masses had melted away
To whisper His secret to one

No fanfare
No pretense
(Truth needs not these fineries)
But in an atmosphere of
Utter Anticlimax
And the anonymity of the grave,
The stone would roll away....

Just because the crowd is gone,
The lights are turned off,
The door is locked
-tell-tale signs of the second day-
Don't suppose the show is over...

...It may not even have begun.

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"My ways are higher than your ways,
My thoughts are higher than your thoughts...
Though the vision tarries, wait for it, it will surely come...
For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for peace and not evil, to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
-Isaiah 55:9, Habakkuk 2:3, Jeremiah 29:11

Lovely wings...



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I have flown so far
God's wings have flown farther still
Watching over me...

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"I have loved you with an everlasting love"
-Jeremiah 31:3

Tuesday, January 23, 2018

Haiku



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This Becoming is
itself in the end, indeed,
will be, Homecoming

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Saturday, January 20, 2018

Birth



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Again and Again
We are born,
In one life
We live Many

But A Thread holds together
And runs through
The Whole

As fragmented 
And disconnected
As the Pieces may seem,
In the end
We shall see
They fit together,

They have always fit together

Beautifully

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"God gave us the gift of life,
It is up to us to give ourselves the gift of Living Well."
-Voltaire

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018

Outpost



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We are
 breadcrumbs
 white blazes
 beacons
 He has placed 
on this planet,
throughout the path,
 plotting out the way 
to The Way 
Himself

 We are Found for the Lost 
Lights in the window 
We are outposts of the Kingdom of Heaven
 for Travelers
 who feel themselves to be

 so very

 far

 from

 Home

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"Behold I tell you, the Kingdom of Heaven is within you and among you"
~Luke 17:21

Thursday, January 4, 2018