Standing Right in Front of You

 

Standing Right in Front of You

(“Jesus said this because the people were saying that he had an evil spirit in him.” Mark 3:30)

You have him standing right in front of you,
the one without the loaded gun,
(No, I do not have a gun).
the one who eschewed the sword,
(Lord of peace, king imbued with grace).
You have him kneeling right in front of you,
the one with the washcloth in his hand.
(No, I do not boast of loss).
the one who disdained the crown,
(Prince of the found and lost).

And still we ignore you, too quiet for our own tastes.
And still we mistake you, too subversive to be a saint.
And still we see demons where healing is measured
in bushels of liberation to the underserving back alleys
and sad mistakes
and perpetual retakes
and weighted heartaches
without ever entering the high stakes
steeples we have erected to point far above
the places you selected to dwell.

We will learn to dissolve our high-minded walls
when we lay down our calls for doctrines to referee
every notion encapsulated minds have formed.
(if they said demons inhabited You,
what prevents us from saying worse about the
least of these?)

Meanwhile we load our rifles, grab our clubs,
march into a garden where a man has been praying
all night long (far after the last refrain of the last psalm)
and demand proof of his identity.

We see demons everywhere when demons have circled our
unrequited thoughts and pulled them tightly around us like
a hat band squeezing our brain. Little room remains to see
the world, the divine,
the image, the new wine,
the healed, the holy
in the feet of one who walks the backroads
slowly, ambling through our souls, one at a time,
and healing those we have left behind.

When God Weeps

When God Weeps

“‘Look,’ said the Judaeans, ‘see how much he loved him!’” John 11:36

Jesus was on the way to Lazarus’ tomb. Martha, Lazarus’ sister had met Jesus on the road, falling at his feet and saying, “If you’d only been here, my brother wouldn’t have died!”

Jesus had received news of Lazarus’ illness, but delayed two full days before embarking for Bethany where Lazarus, Mary and Martha resided. The two sisters and their brother were good friends of Jesus and he stayed often at their home. Now, though Jesus’ friend was very ill, Jesus did not hurry.

Most are so familiar with this story that some of the emotion of the narrative escapes us. But think about Martha meeting Jesus on the road after her brother was already dead four days. She knows, she believes, she has no doubt that if Jesus had been there earlier, he could have healed Lazarus.

Jesus tells her that her brother will live because he is “the resurrection and the life.” Martha holds tight to her trust in Jesus, despite her grief, telling him, “I believe this: that you are the Messiah, the son of God, the one who has come into the world.”

They both make their way back to the house to find Mary being consoled by their friends. Mary immediately tells Jesus the same thing as her sister: “If you’d been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.” Jesus sees her tears and the weeping of those around her and is stirred deeply within, to the point of being troubled.

He asks, “Where have you laid him?” They invite him to come and see.

And then, the memory verse every person knows, because it’s the shortest verse in the Bible: “Jesus wept.” He burst into tears. Not a single tear. Not a little sniffle. He wept. This isn’t the sort of tear you wipe away with a tissue during a sentimental movie. This is deep, from the gut, weeping.

This should astound us. Jesus told his disciples before they left that he was going to Bethany to “wake up” Lazarus. Jesus knew that in only a few moments his friend would come walking out of the tomb he had occupied for half a week. And yet he weeps.

Please don’t picture Jesus here with a tear running down his cheek. This is red-eyed, snot-nosed, full-throated weeping. The preacher would stop preaching at the sound. The singer would stop her song. Everyone would turn to hear where this wailing came from. And they would see the Son of God in full-on waves of grief.

Had we been there I have little doubt we would have said the same as the friends who had gathered: “See how much he loved him.”

Do you see it in your mind? Can you hear Jesus’ weeping? Here is the one who is perfectly human. Jesus is the full representation of what humanity is like. And humanity cries. Humanity weeps. Humanity grieves. Humanity openly expresses pain over the love of someone we lose.

This is important for us. Have you been raised to hold back your emotions? Did people ever say to you, “Don’t cry”? Well, Jesus won’t say that. Cry. Weep. If you are in a situation that feels dead, it is perfectly human to give sway to the emotions within.

Please do not think it a lack of faith to let the tears flow. Please don’t let your culture or upbringing prevent you from giving full expression to the present grief or pain. You may have finally reached your breaking point at your job. Your children may have wandered so far, your heart yearns for them. You may have a breach with your parents. You may even be in an abusive marriage or relationship that once seemed alive. There are actions you can take, but please don’t refrain from weeping.

In the dead moments of life, weeping is the gift God has built into our very being. Now, some of us are more prone to emotional display than others. Only you can know your true self. But please, do not hold back because it does not seem appropriate. Let the tears flow. Pain is real. Grief is real. Dead-end jobs are real. And death is real. So real that the Son of God himself wept deeply as they approached the tomb of the one he loved.

Which brings us to the next observation; not only is it human to feel grief, but God grieves with you. Do not hurry to Lazarus’ resurrection without stopping here for a moment. I don’t care what sermon, what book, or what preacher you’ve heard; your tears are no sign of a lack of faith. Your weeping does not show mistrust. In fact, God weeps with you.

Your pain is God’s pain. Your grief is God’s grief. Your frustration and confusion are His. When you want to bang your head against the wall, God is there, not to scold you, but to hold you. When the hurts of a thousand memories crowd your mind and you wish you were over them by now, God does not upbraid you for your lack of faith. He settles in right with you and weeps so openly that if someone else was in the room they would say, “Look how much God loves her!” “Look how much God loves him!”

And, by the way, once you have learned this to be true, you are able to weep for others as well. Your tears will come more easily than your judgment. Your heart will be moved by those you once dismissed. You won’t be afraid to embrace those whose lives are shattered because You’ve felt the weeping heart of God. You no longer feel compelled to tell people, “Come on, look alive!” You have learned to weep with others.

Above and beyond it all is life! Jesus knew the depth of his friends’ grief, he expressed the overflow of his own love for Lazarus, but he also was about to show that he ultimately comes to bring life, abiding life, eternal life.

So he stood at that tomb, raised his voice and shouted, “Lazarus—come out!” And Lazarus did. The graveclothes still hung from him; his face still wrapped in the cloth. They untied him and Lazarus was restored to his family.

Please do not be hard on yourself if, in the middle of what feels like a graveyard, you don’t feel very alive. But here is what I know. The more you open yourself to truly expressing your heart and the more you open your heart to God’s empathetic love for you, the closer you will be to knowing within that, no matter the situation, there is life. That life is in Jesus, fully and completely, and he loves you so much he will weep with you though the healing takes a lifetime.

Sugar-Coating and Muddy Waters

Sugar-Coating and Muddy Waters

“But Naaman’s servants went to him and said, ‘Master, if the prophet had asked you to do some extraordinary act, wouldn’t you have done it? Why shouldn’t you do as he said: “Wash and be clean”?’” 2 Kings 5:13

I have heard and read a lot recently from people who complain about a “sugar-coated” gospel. First of all, I’m not always sure what they mean. But, from experience, it usually means they think other people should abide by certain rules and that too much “grace” will simply let them get away with too much sin. Of course these same people have their own sins to deal with which they either ignore, or for which they are happy to accept as much grace as possible.

There is a delightful story in the Old Testament that can be used to illustrate the idea of grace with zero requirements for reception. Stay with me. I will try to tell the story as concisely as possible.

Syria was a great kingdom and Naaman was commander of the king’s army. He was highly respected and a good soldier. But Naaman had leprosy.

Once, when the Syrians went on raids, they brought a captive girl from Israel. She became the servant of Naaman’s wife. The girl told her that there was a prophet in Samaria (the capital of Israel) who could cure him of his leprosy.

We are going to jump ahead in the story and see what happens when he and Elisha meet. Naaman arrived at Elisha’s home and the prophet sent out a messenger to him, “Wash yourself seven times in the Jordan River, and your skin will be healthy and clean.” The world “clean” in this context means “healed” but can also refer to something that is “acceptable to God.” Elisha was telling him to do a simple act and Naaman would be completely whole.

But Naaman expected a supernatural act. Like many of us, when we think about God doing something special, we expect fireworks, lightning, thunder, voices, doves, or any number of phenomena. “I thought he would at least come out of his house, stand somewhere, call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the infected place, and heal the skin disease,” says Naaman. He even complains that Elisha didn’t have him wash in his own “home” rivers, the Abana or Pharpar. “They have better water than any of the rivers in Israel!” Naaman turns and leaves in anger.

Naaman’s servant pipes up with some wisdom. (By the way, do you notice how the two “servants” in this story move it along? Never close your mind to the wisdom of the unlikely.) He says, “If the prophet had asked you to do some extraordinary act, wouldn’t you have done it? Why shouldn’t you do as he said: ‘Wash and be clean’?”

This must have been a well-trusted servant because if I was Naaman I might have given him a piece of my mind. “Hey, servant, whose side are you on, anyway? The dude didn’t even come out of his house to greet me! This is insulting.”

But instead Naaman went and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the prophet had instructed. His skin became “healthy again like a child’s skin.” I would have loved to be on the scene for that moment. The muddy waters of the Jordan envelop this warrior from a foreign land for the seventh time, he stands up, his hair and beard dripping in the sun, and he draws his arms out of the water, seeing them smooth and unblemished for the first time. Would he have run to the shore and hugged his servant? Would have dipped himself an eighth time just for good measure? All he did was go underneath the water of the Jordan seven times. He did no “extraordinary act.” This foreigner, this warrior whose king had actually enslaved an Israeli girl, this man was the recipient of God’s healing by simply dipping himself in muddy waters.

Naaman returns to Elisha’s home, finally encountering him face to face. “Now I know that there’s no god in the whole world, except the God of Israel. So please accept a present from me,” he says. Elisha refuses the gift, even though Naaman urges him twice.

So far, notice this: Naaman did nothing to “earn” this healing. He was a foreigner from a semi-hostile state. Indeed, he thought he should do some “mighty thing” to receive it. Instead, he simply bathed in the Jordan River. There was a reason for that, of course, pointing to the God of Israel as the one true God. But Naaman had to meet no requirements for this healing.

And, after he is healed, Naaman wants to give something in return. That is a normal human reaction, and it speaks to his good character. But Elisha strongly refused. There was nothing he did to “earn” his healing before it happened, there was no amount he could “pay” in response to it afterward. It was free!

Now, follow me for a bit more “sugar-coating”. He asks for someone to provide him “as much dirt as a pair of mules can carry.” He promises to sacrifice to the Lord alone from that point on, probably upon an altar built from the dirt. But, he does ask some understanding. He says, “May the Lord forgive me when my master goes to the temple of Rimmon to worship, leans on my arm, and I have to bow down in the temple of Rimmon. When I do this, may the Lord forgive me for this one thing.”

What? No way, Naaman. If your commitment to sacrifice only to the Lord is real, you will quit that job, or tell your boss that you are changed, brother! Dude, God will provide for you. Stop working for that man!

Right? Put in our own placeholder: “Now that you want to serve Jesus, you can’t do….that!” Get out of that ungodly environment. Have some faith, bro. God will honor your faith!

So, what did the prophet Elisha say when Namaan asks that the Lord “forgive me this one thing” when he has to bow in the temple of idolatry because of his job? Elisha responds, “Go in peace.”

Elisha was wise, and so should we be. He left Namaan to work out the details of this new service to the Lord.

Jesus refers to this story in his first sermon in his hometown of Nazareth: “There were also many people with skin diseases in Israel in the prophet Elisha’s time. But God cured no one except Naaman from Syria.” (Luke 4:27) This made the people furious! Why? Because Jesus had announced grace to “outsiders”! Maybe they thought he was “sugar-coating” the gospel?

Nat Turney, lead pastor at Open Table Fellowship wrote on the church's Facebook page:

I have been accused by some of preaching a "candy-coated" gospel…I don't just preach a "candy-coated" gospel, I preach a "Blue Bell ice cream sundae, drenched with hot fudge, buried in whipped cream with a hundred cherries on top" gospel. I preach a "deep-fried twinkie, covered in chocolate, dusted with powdered sugar and drizzled with caramel" gospel. The gospel I preach is so sweet, you'll need to have your blood sugar tested afterwards. The gospel I preach and the message that I have devoted my life to is, as the word "gospel" suggests, GOOD NEWS. So, yeah...the gospel I preach is the "too good to be true" good news that the Creator of everything is especially fond of you. He is more committed to you than you could ever be to Him. He is working all things together for your good and will never, ever, allow an ounce of your pain to be wasted. This is a gospel message that is worth our devotion and that prompts us to shout from the rooftops that He is good, all the time. Be blessed! (https://www.facebook.com/nat.turney)

The story of Naaman is only a shadow of the beautiful GOOD NEWS of Jesus Christ. It is grace, all grace. Yes, lives will be changed and transformed, but not because we get picky with them and start telling them how to apply this grace. The Holy Spirit is oh-so-much wiser than any of us.

Welcoming

"But the people learned where Jesus went and followed him. Jesus welcomed them and talked with them about God’s kingdom. He healed those who needed to be healed. " Luke 9:11

I know what it is like to just want to get away from people and be alone. Spending time with a few intimate friends always energizes me. I can get lost in conversation and mutual displays of wit (or supposed wit). But, much time in large crowds actually drains me. This has become more acute as I have dealt with my headache I woke up with almost seven years ago, and has yet do go away. I have a limited amount of energy I can spend on the buzz of human interaction before I need to hide away. Jesus, however, seems to always stop for those who need Him, even when He needs solitude the most.

An Economy of Grace

An Economy of Grace

(“Heal the sick who are there and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’” Luke 10:9)

It is a close-up in sepia with venetian red from chin to forehead;
Her eyes are halfway open as the lids slowly meet; the lashes are so long
they nearly preclude the closing created by history, fatigue and pain.

Back it up, rewind those mysterious eyes, and replay at half-speed the
cropped face with no context or place; perhaps it is a single frame, may two,
but the emerald glint is clear, two jewels hid between treasure chest lids;
she hides the beauty, for once the sadness is seen, our eyes can lie for us,
the gleam of turquoise, sapphire or aquamarine sent full-spectrum through our tears
betray our struggle with pain

Unless we look away at just the right moment, just the right angle,
and keep our eyelids resting upon the other until the observer takes leave,
distracted by some fully open eyes with every single ray of the sun finding
each natural facet in the iris speaking health to every spectator.

But, whether we think the eyes facing us
are the artwork of another fine cinematographer,
or message sent freely (to me) to us, we sense
one awake and one bored to sickness and we may often
leave them both alone.

Yet the two (who represent nearly all) may both be mourning,
hoping a new storehouse of pastels will renew the hues we’ve
allowed to disguise the pain we hardly let the spectators see
and, unhealed, we keep smiling with our eyes,
or sleeping with our lashes barely touching so we can
bit by bit take a slice of light in.

Let the watchers say, whether the light is lost or shining,
whether coasting or climbing; this ill-represented earthen
world
is not a kingdom with grace unfurled. There is another place
within this place, another answer that is Yes and Yes,
another jurisdiction without posts or fences or borders:

Just a healing fountain at every step you take toward
the King whose love pours in the light and ignites the colors
in fifth-world wonder. Waking, sleeping, hiding or weeping;

The kingdom is healing, its colors stream like repeater rainbows
opening the eyes alive and day-free, every-mercy. An economy
of grace that floods the red ledgers and destroys their discrepancies.

A Few Ways

A Few Ways

(“And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done all things well; he even makes the deaf hear and the dumb speak.’” Mark 7:37)

And here are a few other ways that He is different from
gurus and pundits, spiritualists and sages.
He turns the entire world inside out, the foundations we dug
now float away to the hidden warehouses of the snow.
And He builds with cast-off lumber, chinked bricks,
scads of shards indistinguishable from pebbles strewn
on the hardpan soil of desert expanse.

And here are a few other ways He challenges the
assumption of His some-time prophets who see the
End OF THE World at every shaking off San Francisco,
Peru or Japan. Or the scan the skies for the latest
blue moon array and exclaim the telltale signs that Jesus
is ready to get real mad now that He has spent 2,000 years
holding in all his anger, being nice, and all, full of grace and all,
for over two millennia, and that is more than enough time to wait.
The world was created in a week, and within the next week His
lightning and thunder will bloodily turn the undertow foamy.
Mark the date, people,
Empty your plates, people,
Walk straight, people because the Eastern Sky will explode
in gall and wrath just days after I’ve finished cashing all my checks
sent in by so many who
took the bait, people.

And here are a few other ways to welcome His coming
with visits to the unwashed cells of unwanted humans,
with encounters in stuffy rooms that smell of excrement where
the unknown aged wait their last breath alone,
with cookies for children with sores upon their faces,
with hugs for antagonists,
honey for adversaries,
and healing for every man (high, low, above, below)
who has a past you’ve never met, but who has a past
that keeps him awake at night.

And here are a few other ways He is different
than
any
other.

One Moment When

One Moment When

(“Let me dwell in Your tent forever; let me take refuge in the shelter of Your wings.” Psalm 61:4)

Now on fire, later quenched by rain,
expecting on thing and finding another again.
Finally, at the end of one day out of 18,000
air and dust collide, light and depth align,
clouds exercise restraint, the skies glow invisible paint,
heat rises, sounds and buzzes hold back their breath for
one moment when

Like the hub of a carousel, straight forward and peripheral
are stopped. Motion, time’s stopwatch, holds back the next moment
like the explosive silence just before a belly laugh.

Somehow, on that one day in the 60^th year; one moment, an uncertain division of 1/60^th of a minute: Mute and Fire

have met the desire of a single man’s hopes until now.

Suspend me above the measured days, O Lord,
let me see fuller than my gaze. Let me rest,
where pain cannot reach. Take the spin off everything,
heal the bruises friends that were kisses, and hold the doors open
long enough
that I can show up for
one moment when

Like the hub of the universe, the sky is a jigsaw piece, and
silence is the explosive moment when angels are taking a breath.

At Peace/In Pain

“I leave behind with you—peace; I give you my own peace and my gift is nothing like the peace of this world. You must not be distressed and you must not be daunted.” John 14:27

I had a very bad day yesterday. The pain level was a bit higher than normal and I can often power through a day like that. But depression hit very hard as well. I was in tears at some time throughout most of the day. Add to that the anxiety of teaching Romans 1 in our midweek Bible study. (Read the chapter and you’ll understand my apprehensions. It is probably one of the most misused of all Scripture to attack our homosexuality in particular, and all sin in general. As we neared the end of the chapter I told our group, “Please keep reading, because Paul kept writing.”)

If You Will Believe

“Jesus said to her, ‘Dear woman, you are made well because you believed. Go in peace.’” Luke 8:48

“Dear woman,” He said. More literally, Jesus called her “Daughter”. It is the only time in Scripture that Jesus addresses a woman this way. I do not know what she was called by others, or what names floated in her own thinking. But, I’m sure many of them were quite unaffectionate.

The Touch of Healing

“As it happened, Publius’s father was ill with fever and dysentery. Paul went in and prayed for him, and laying his hands on him, he healed him.” Acts 28:8

Paul and his sailing companions had been forced to seek shelter from a terrible storm on the island of Malta. Although the people were kind, it was a bit of a scary start. Cold and rainy, the men built a fire and a poisonous snake, driven out by the heat, bit Paul on the hand.

Time to Run

“Right away a woman came to him whose little girl was possessed by a demon. She had heard about Jesus and now she came and fell at his feet.” Mark 7:25

She was in desperate straits. There was nowhere to turn. She was not part of the accepted religious people of her time. She was a Greek, a Gentile; she was outside the circle of those who had the golden ticket to God’s blessings. There were pagan gods, to be sure. She could bow to nearly any idol of her choosing.

Carrying

“Four of those who came were carrying a man who could not walk.” Mark 2:3

Dale was my best friend throughout High School. We met our freshman year and both went to First Christian Church in Concord, CA. We were not at all alike. I was an artsy hippy, involved in drama and music. He loved tech work and cars. But, what bound us together initially was a girl. We both had crushes on Sheri. Also our same age, she attended another are High School and went to the same church we did. We both had huge crushes on her.

The God who Sees

"You have seen it, O Lord. Do not keep quiet. O Lord, do not be far from me.” Psalm 35:22

Let’s be honest, most conflicts are hardly black and white. We humans are gloriously flawed and there is both freedom and responsibility in accepting this. Knowing we can be wrong, off base, way out in left field or not even in the ballpark actually frees us from having to prove how right we must be.

The Corner of the Desk

The Corner of the Desk

(“And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.” James 5:15)

The cardboard box full of neatly folded tissues
is squarely arranged on top of the desk..though…

At its feet, tossed like carnations, the wadded few have
absorbed the tears of honesty, the stories of pain
we hear with uneasy skill.

Do you want to know the valleys, do you care
to listen with love; will you embrace the uncommon tale
baked on the days of withheld rain?

Will they offer you more than a mirror’s image,
will they speak in unknown tongues and await your
uncertain interpretation, will you return their entrusted heart
unharmed? Remember how they entered, completely unarmed;
sat in the corner chair, never broke eye contact with

The corner of the desk.

Will their dreams reset to innocence, or will the scars
we touched set off alarms when incidents of trust sounded
like the screech of eagles scanning prey.

When they hand us, on cold and sweaty palms, the heart traced
with anxieties unspoken countless alones, how will we return the trust
of confessed cracks they’ve kept turned from the sun? Dying is easier
that new incisions over aged scars.

When they hand us, on bent and broken wings, tiny faith
still alive with shallow breath and captured eyes, will we show
our own wounds now

A second Masterpiece;

Filled cracks the brush’s tracks where the Father’s hands
retraced creation’s plans. Day, light, night, sleep are sweet
where the wounds once ruled.

Hope for the Broken

“Moses told this to the Israelites; but they would not listen to Moses, because of their broken spirit and their cruel slavery.” Exodus 6:9

There are few greater joys in my life than my three children. Though they all are now grown and out of the house, the memories of their childhood and the relationship we have as adults combine to give me great delight. I loved watching their first steps as babies, and their first steps into college, family and careers. I am grateful to have three loving, yet very different children.

The Former Country is Fading

The Former Country is Fading

(“Therefore, accept each other in the same way that Christ accepted you. He did this to bring glory to God.” Romans 15:7)

Did you come to the door just to tell me
that the party time had changed: and
those who peeked from behind the curtain,
were they early or late? or today’s top 10 list
with no room for 11?

Did you think your silence in the face of truth
made it any less a lie? Were the promises you made,
but had no intentions of keeping, worth the same confessions
you eked from the mouth of one already sweating
grief over his own slide down the black volcanic ash?

What word of knowledge did you possess,
to pretend to a microscope into my heart?
What word of wisdom did you purchase,
that inserted a microphone into my unspoken?

Whose prophet are you? And what puppets
wore your hands like gloves? Who gave you permission
to play like Pharaoh and send the helpless to another
desert drier than a year of chastisement making bricks
without straw and without pay?

Whose apostle sent you? That after the wander,
and after the promise, and after another
semi-miraculous crossing, you waited till we
finally caught our breath and announced, after the cure,
that there was no healing after all.

I’ve sent too many home myself, peeked out from the window
and pretended I was not home. You and I are no different
though, I wish you only the best, and
I wish
some of us were not the only
who had to confess.

The day grows slow now
and the former country is fading. This is an old song,
and the words are memorized, while the healing, without
prophets or evangelists or laying on of hands or vials of oil
is undeniably Divine.

He Healed Them

He Healed Them

(“Moving away from there, Jesus went along the sea of Galilee, climbed the hill and sat there.” Matthew 15:29)

We bring limps and aching, words we wasted,
fantastic thunder we thought was ours for the taking.
We bring our latest, our untasted seasons flavorless
for all our hot explanations.

We bring our tears and breaking, feuds we blooded,
brothers and sisters flooded by our dogma, our determination
to force the joints into place before You could touch them true.

We bring our sight and blindness, knots we tightened,
abrasive blindfolds we put over pretenses of kindness.
We bring our boil or freeze; we bring our luxury and ease,
We bring cuts and sharp; we bring dreary, we bring dull,
We bring our unfinished; we bring our diminished
proofs signed by the same ghosts You’ve named from
the beginning.

We bring our ending, we bring up the rear,
we bring up the past, we ring up the clear notes
we hope prove us innocent at last.

Who do You see, on the hill, under the tree,
as we elbow our way, morning to finally?

Who do you heal but the sick and maimed,
and why do we submit certificates of health: claimed, certified, insane.

We bring our innocence, broken at last;
we bring our signature, erased at last;
we bring our only hope, emptied at last.

And at last as first Your touch is birth and life,
we bring our claims and bury them,
our boasts and surrender them,
newborns breathing as first.

Fierce Compassion

Fierce Compassion

“When Jesus got out of the boat, he saw a large crowd of people. He felt sorry for them, and he healed the ones who were sick.” Matthew 14:14

What crosses your mind when you see a large crowd? The “large crowd” of vehicles during rush hour has been known to cause road rage. The large crowds at the mall might cause someone else a bit of social anxiety. And, large crowds like the Occupy movement might elicit a whole range of emotions depending on our political leanings.

Last Night's Reverie

Last Night’s Reverie

(“Naaman walked down to the Jordan; he waded out into the water and stooped down in it seven times, just as Elisha had told him. Right away, he was cured, and his skin became as smooth as a child’s.” 2 Kings 5:14)

I know you said your dreams never live up to their billing,
promising you neon and pastels well into October;
I heard you describe the him and the her who stroked your forehead
at just the right time.

I know you awoke with no hand on your brow,
I know you remembered only the introduction to
words that spun silk around the span from your hands
to the offers of help.
By the time the last act opened, the moments just before
your eyes made it morning,
the offer was withheld and someone was pulling you from behind,
grabbing the loop on the back of your favorite denim jacket.

Waiting to understand the meaning of the dream,
I remember you couldn’t decide to cry or arise to
wash your face. So you wasted the morning (your words, not mine)
on the couch and holding last night’s dream
wishing the hand that touched your nighttime would
knock on the door and offer something more than
you’ve been waiting inside and outside for.

I know you think it’s creased and masked,
a latex buffoon of who you used to be. A caricature
with a bigger nose and open pores, while you spent your morning
wishing for the relief that dreams recited like
serenades on a back porch summer.

So here are words to tell you, after last night’s reverie,
I am here, always; late or early, smooth or wrinkle,
some or every; to say or silent the time when
waking seems sadder than last night’s dream.

Etch the Diagnosis

Etch the Diagnosis

(“Calling His twelve disciples to Him, He gave them power over depraved spirits to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every malady.” Matthew 10:1)

Compassion learned is compassion returned to its source;
the beautiful eyes that gaze on ugly days and interpret them
as gems still dirt and grime. Where evil lurks,
healing wins the day. Where darkness hides the leper’s sores,
daylight shows pain not shame to well-learned disciples
who no longer gasp at trapped souls,
no longer gag at vague memories of atrocities inflicted by
them on
us.

Evil still is evil long upon the gray apparitions,
But healing wins the loving back in spectrum’s fullest range:
from infra-red to ultra-violet, sins and violence are sickness
ravaging immunity.

Come once to the Heart which spoke Love upon nothing,
See once the eyes that envisioned dewy strolls with mankind,
hear today the voice that spoke a planet and baby-smell,
Touch the Hands that molded the clay, Lips that breathed the spirit,
and Feet that walked with open wounds in our unsanitary sanity.

Oh religion, die upon your insistences! Oh prejudices disguised as
righteous renditions; meet Him for a day, go to Him in a way
that molts the skin of shammery. We are crust left on the counter
too long.

We will come and sit at Your feet, Physician of our certainties,
and, throwing away our notebooks and pens, let You etch
the diagnosis and healing upon our hearts instead.