Of All Days

Of All Days

(“So all Israel brought up the ark of the covenant of the Lord with shouts, with the sounding of rams’ horns and trumpets, and of cymbals, and the playing of lyres and harps.” 1 Chronicles 15:28)

So I said to them, once the lightness had returned to my step:

“I was warned about the storms you bring,
with your refusals to sing, and everything you see that has
turned the great green world black. I will not turn back.”

And they just looked at me, mouths hanging open, not a breath taken,
and spears for eyes that pierced the thought bubble above my head:

They said:

“When will you learn it is our call to burn the beastly fields
that are filled with weeds and wheat beneath your feet. When will
you see, take note, and agree with our proposal, read it squarely,
about our disposal of human garbage at the curb.”

And I just looked at them, mouth hanging open, my breath still shaken,
and years of lies that made me feel different. Until this little bit of time.

Come on, people. Dance, people. Look upward, darlings. Look outward, pals.
Listen slowly, sisters. Listen surely, brothers. For the demons are canceled
for the day.

Invite every opponent, swing open the mighty iron gates,
Lay out the long red carpet, Ring the bells, it’s not too late
for every point on the globe to hear the chimes singing,
“Disrobe your objections and dance the directions of the
three-beats-in-one.”

So I said to them, once the smoke rose above the clouds
the hugged the sun like chariot wheels across the sky:

“Here is why I wrote this tune (I knew the lyrics would drive
you crazy, and still, there they are.) Do you see how far we are
from the

Joy of Mercy

The

Glee of Grace

The

Hymn of Peace

And the

Cancelled Notes we owed and could never pay? So I ask honestly,
Why, on this, of all days, would you try to keep anyone away?”

I Just Have to Tell You

I Just Have to Tell You

(“Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, ‘Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come…and save you.’” Isaiah 35:3-4

I hate to admit but my eyes are blood-red this morning,
blood-red since yesterday, closed and shut throughout the night.
I though we both received the same orders; the ones I received decades
ago, the same you’ve heard from the mouth of the Lord:

“Go into the world..”

But, here is where my eyes break down, where my stomach lodges
clear up into my throat,
where my fingers shake from mistaken interpretations as
more and more act like dragons
and spit fire at the world they think has begun its
persecution.

“Go into all the world…”

But we gossip about the “family on welfare” where,
parked just in front of the sagging garage,
was a fancy car, a new car, a car sans scratches, and
one that matches your best desire for one too.
And you step into church, with the first sentence ringing:
“I drove by Linda’s place. Ha…she gets food stamps while there
is a fancy car in her driveway!” And our dragon saliva lights the
next best gossips to say the same. Worship did not happen that day,
I think Jesus ran away to comfort the object of these good peoples’ scorn.

“Go into all the world and preach…”

Hey, we pay a pastor to do that. And, boy can he tell a story. I mean,
he has our ear every week. (And they go home never taking their
booster thoughts of truth.) We pay a pastor well, until, he meddles
in politics, or sex, or money. And we would report him the moment
he mentioned the Democrats’ solutions. We don’t walk out, we just
leave our post and send letters of excuses, because I want to leave worship
like a massage, and without bruises.

“Go into all the world and preach the Good News…”

That’s the Ten Commandments, isn’t it? Oh it is so sad that they won’t
let us
post the 10 on every state house lawn, or every
telephone pole alone I-5. We used to be such a godly nation. (Decimating
Native Americans, Enslaving African tribes, Denying Votes to fellow females,
and rounding up every Japanese inside chicken-wire ghettos. Not to mention
lynchings and mobs and bombs targeted with hateful precision.)
We used to be such a Christian Nation.

“Go into all the world and preach the Good News to every creature…”

But you better take a gun with you, or mace, or pepper spray, and don’t
stay too long in the neighborhoods marked by poverty and starvation.
“Here’s a per diem, you can buy all the food you want at McDonald's or
Arby’s. Spend your money wisely, and you will come out ahead.”
They watch us, well, they see us well. And, at least we went on
this mission trip
when the others stayed home without precedent.

By the way, did you notice that one house. Oh it was decrepit. Shutters
hanging askew. Wood siding cracked, splintered and eaten a foot above the
foundation wall. Broken windows and forgotten screens, roof shingles
looked like a melting cake frosting. And then, (don’t mention this to
anyone else)

But, did you notice, that a Cadillac pulled up, maybe two years old,
and shiny, oh it was shiny. It gleamed golden in the sun. Those seats
were leather, I know they were. I just have to tell you. It makes me
mad, people like this, using my taxes to get themselves ahead.

…and preach the Good News…

I’m sorry, God, we didn’t get to it today.

Sabbaths and Anthems

Sabbaths and Anthems

“Moses gave you circumcision (not that it is from Moses, but from the fathers), and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man's whole body well? Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” John 7:22-24

How do you respond when you read about the Pharisees judging Jesus because He healed someone on the Sabbath? I imagine it at least makes you roll your eyes, right? Jesus, in great compassion, heals people suffering because they are blind, deaf or even harassed by demons. I’m sure that if we were there, we would be jumping in joy when we a blind friend is able to see for the first time in his life!

But, religious people are full of criticism. They don’t like to lead with love. They cannot even take the time to think things through. No, if something offends them, they are ready to damage the person’s reputation for the sake of their own dead beliefs. So, Jesus heals on the Sabbath and the Pharisees are after Jesus with their fangs bared and saliva foaming at their mouths.

Jesus, with only one goal; to honor His Father, is attacked by those who considered themselves the religious guardians of truth. “Keep the Sabbath” meant, “don’t do anything we think is wrong on the Sabbath.” Of course, they already hated Jesus, he had so many people following him. Now, they thought they had a foolproof way to rid themselves of this nuisance.

But the Pharisees had gotten things way out of proportion. It was more important to rigidly keep Sabbath “laws” than it was to heal someone on the Sabbath. They said Jesus was leading people astray, and would eventually hatch a plot to kill him. Don’t be too aghast, we see it happen quite often in the “Christian” world today.

A young black man becomes deeply disturbed that a greater percentage of blacks are killed by white police officers than are whites. Stop, take a breath, and put yourself in his place. The numbers bare the inequity out. Recently a large church on the East Coast invited those in their congregation who were minorities to share their experiences with Law Enforcement. To quote a friend who attended:

“We did an entire Sunday morning testimony service to blacks and other minorities sharing their feelings and negative interactions with L.E. (law enforcement). It was eye opening for some of the older white parishioners. When they saw how many testimonies there were it was hard to dismiss them as isolated incidents.”

So, a young 28-year-old second string quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers expressed his grief by kneeling when the National Anthem was played. He did not riot. He did not yell expletives. He merely knelt quietly as the anthem was sung. And so the “Sabbath rules” are broken!

Let me come at it this way. Would a first century Christian ever even consider making a vow of allegiance to the Roman Empire? It is easy to say, “Well, that was an evil entity.” Then the question would be, “at what point do we make allegiance to an empire a higher priority than allegiance to Christ, or to a cause that our devotion to Christ moves us toward?”

It is fine to stand during the National Anthem. It is wonderful to refrain from work on the Sabbath. But here’s the difference: The Pharisees’ judgement was far out of proportion. Not carrying a pallet and making clay on the Sabbath were far more important than healing someone. Jesus tries to correct them.

If you were deeply pained over an issue in your nation you deemed unjust, it would be appropriate to call attention to the injustice. That is what Kaepernick is doing. You may disagree with it. You may never choose to protest in that way. But, to castigate him, to call him names, to challenge his sincerity is also to have things far out of proportion. Which is a higher call: to bring attention to injustice in the land, or to stand during the Anthem?

But, as a follower of Jesus, those are not even my primary concerns. What has caused me to actually weep is other Christians calling him names, saying he should be forced out of the country, and one “pastor” even saying that anyone else that did that should be “lined up and shot!” There is one Facebook meme that has a picture of Bin Laden above a picture of Kaepernick with the caption: “If Bin Laden had a son.” (Oh, just to make a tiny point about “respect”, I can’t tell you the number of times people keep talking to each other when the Scripture is read.)

The brand of “Christianity” that I am seeing among in our country is growing worse each political cycle.  Next time you are ready to call a public figure names, try to exercise some empathy. You don’t even have to agree with them, but at least think about it a bit. We are men and women who have taken Jesus as our own.

Do you really think Jesus would compare Kaepernick to a demon-possessed terrorist? Do you really think Jesus would throw his name all over social media with every negative and ugly word you can imagine? Do you honestly think Jesus would spit in the man’s face before he actually listens carefully to not only his words, but his heart?

And, if Jesus did feel Kaepernick needed to be dealt with, I wonder how He would approach him? Of course, there is Zacchaeus, a guy who sided with the occupying nation against his own people by overtaxing them and keeping it for himself. Now there is a guy to rake over the coals, right?

Go read what Jesus did…and perhaps we should do likewise.

Pop the Words

Pop the Words

(“How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God?” John 5:44)

You pop the right words, “God gave me”,
and “Christ told me”, and “I’m led to”,

But why I cannot find you when
the poor need another week of bread,

Why you are not running
to open the bus doors for the
children who smell just like you did
when you were a child that smelled;
did you stay home to avoid another buffet line?

You’ve changed your words, but still shoot daggers
at the same people as before. Now you quote Scripture
to prove how right your intolerance has become.

Come now, sing the tune, the words, the Spirit,
the same as we have sung for centuries on end. Why?
Do you?

You set your timer to go off at exactly the moment
you notice
no one notices
your commitment; your words last only
as long
as they are easy to speak. Hard to keep and
the alarm rings

And the Pastor is preaching suspect passages,
the doctors are only practicing, not healing,
the teachers don’t know their curriculum
and the banjo player gets his fingers stuck in
the strings.

Or so it seems to hear your report.

You met Jesus, and all he did was give you a new vocabulary
to tear up and shred every decent person who ever tried

To help you a decent person. And “Christ”, as you call Him,
is not Christ at all if You have forgotten the blessing of doing
what nobody ever notices.

Original Intent

Original Intent

(“They didn’t demand an accounting from the men into whose hand they delivered the money…for they dealt faithfully. 2 Kings 12:15)

I will trust you with these words, and leave them in your care,
for, until this time and backward a plural of degrees
you have kept them carefully and incubated their design;

A harder task than most realize.

So, as I deposit them to your account, I trust you will keep
them unmixed
from other motifs and sentiments as well you can,
for rationalizations exist for withdrawing notes from

Unrelated accounts and attaching them; addendums never
realized nor penned by my familiar signature.

My words are the handiwork of my heart, and my
heart
is (as yours is) fragile, yet true. Will you,
as I place them in your safekeeping, administer them,

Not as your own,
but as you know I meant them to be.

I’ve seen the conversations, the sloppy accounting,
where lines are crossed out or carelessly erased,
and then quickly replaced with overtones never
implied in the original autograph. I have seen you,

In my mind’s eye,

Solitary at eve with undried sighs,
knowing replacing the replacements
with your own erasure would raise newer suspicions
about your original intent.