The Christian Distinctive (Warning: soapbox alert)

“And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.” Luke 6:33

I am a Pentecostal. I am glad to be a Pentecostal (notice I did not say “proud”). I have been “Pentecostal” from within the first year or so of my faith in Christ. I am happy that my acquaintance with Christ was not loaded down with a bunch of doctrinal baggage that explained away what are commonly called the “gifts of the Spirit.” From early on, in a Bible study I attended with a dozen or more people who found Christ together in the mid 70s, we simply read the Bible together and accepted what it said as if it were meant for us as well.

Unrehearsed

Unrehearsed

You set the stage that day,
for a backward age that might send
you off down the years
before tears and stains painted wrinkles
at the corner of practiced smiles.

You wished it clean, the mind and matter
that scattered your private dreams toward the sky,
seen by every passerby, but still unnamed.

Your innocence passed too fast; forward through
the crowded tunnel where those who enter
all arrive at the same destination. Outside that
grand opening, with eyes squinted shut at the sun’s
silver blast,
we face each other with nowhere else to go.

You made your decision, unfeigned, unpainted;
while the grain showed the pattern of joy and pain,
your eyes caught every motion, your mouth once
announcing ocean high and low, ebb and flood;

While most of us just cover up with scented suds.

You called us to our places that day,
far ahead of your age, no wrinkles named
by curled lips, and blackbird feet;
you smelled the air, heard the spring like
lilacs overhead, and knew, old or early,
the day could not wait until more audience arrived.

She stepped out from among us, began the truth-telling
(like a folk story retelling), that helped spell-bound
the one or two, either side of her,
who heard her eschew a fully staged confession, to
trade it for the first
unrehearsed whisper.

I Do not Qualify

I Do not Qualify

(“After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, ‘Follow me.’” Luke 5:27)

How many times have You asked me;
over and over until I got up out of my crouch,
or just once, while You waited for the Yes
to run from my mouth to my feet? Direction
and discreet turns of phrase to keep me disguised
well enough.

I could follow, my name misspelled enough,
to enjoy the walk without explaining my choice.

Pretty soon I found the rags You left me, donned them,
looked bereft as I thought You meant me,
and talked just like the guys on the radio who
told me where to turn in my Bible while I was driving
deliveries for the downtown pharmacy in the VW bug
without a muffler. I don’t think I followed better then,
but the rest of Your team certainly thought I did.

Finally, a decade or so, I think my heart is finally in it,
but more lost than the day I left my seat. I don’t mean
to complain, but a high school education makes me feel
like no one at all when I am sure I could have studied, striding
down Berkeley’s Halls on at least a scholarship or half.
But I left the hope for higher learning thinking You meant
my sight set on Higher learning yet. I will follow You to
the end,
I will.
But we will have to have a conversation about that at
the end,
we will.

My heart is in it, following You, I mean. My feet and hands
and voice and wardrobe are sadder than they have ever been.
All I want to do is ask each one at the crossroad to
follow You,
but it is not enough, and teary I remember pictures I
nailed on the dream walls; preaching to half a thousand,
teaching to hundreds who memorized the notes in hand.

I do not qualify for the big sky palaces, they want Masters of
Divinity,
not Community College dropouts like me.

My heart is in it, following You, I mean. I’m must not sure
where that means for me to go, my voice is throaty, my thoughts
disjointed, my eyes red with tears, and my feet swollen. I love You
more,
and more Your people as well.

For me, please, grant the hundreds of friends and fields and
mother and brothers You said I would have in
this world
as well as
the world
to come.

Why I Keep Following (When it Hurts so Bad)

“God’s kingdom isn’t just a lot of words. It is power.” 1 Corinthians 4:20

The question hangs at the end of so many sentences. Those less connected to faith in Christ might be more likely to verbalize it, but it is not far from the thoughts of many who have been at least “church folk” for many years. I know the question well, because it is the one I have wrestled with the last few years: “If Jesus does not, or cannot, relieve this constant suffering of headache pain you endure, why do you keep following Him?”

Telling the Good News

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me. He has anointed me to tell the good news to poor people. He has sent me to announce freedom for prisoners. He has sent me so that the blind will see again. He wants me to free those who are beaten down.” Luke 4:18

Jesus returned to His hometown of Nazareth and attended synagogue as was His custom. He had been teaching at synagogues throughout the area. This time things were different. I do not know if He had quoted Scripture or spoken there before, but this Sabbath He made quite an impression. Quoting from Isaiah 61 about ultimate freedom God would bring to Israel, particularly through His Messiah, He put the scroll away and sat down.

Just Plant

Just Plant

(“The one who plants and the one who waters really do not matter. It is God who matters, because he makes the plant grow.” 1 Corinthians 3:7)

The announcements overheard, the ones that woke the
morning drowse and weave,
implied the job would never be done well enough,
and numbers weren’t as numerous as the count
of harvests years ago.

It rattled expectation, the promise that waited so far
out of reach. We could run faster then, true enough,
but we usually missed half our turns in our haste
to break the speed records of a generation ago.

The money rolls in just fine, sometimes between the lines,
but the worry doesn’t change much, dollars or thousands,
and the measure is never the bank account’s balance;
but the friends we take the chances with. They are better comfort,
finer enhancement than antique candelabras in the remodeled narthex.

It still remains, though, that the numbers are lower than
the days of lush vegetation in the backyard garden;
roses in rows from fence to garage; tomatoes dressed
green to red climbing the fence along the patio. These days,
having put off planting, grass grows taller than the single rose bush
I planted

The week after Dad died.

I’m embarrassed about my depression,
blushing that so much space is filled with so few faces,
and hope, now, when my lope is slower, to remember to

Just plant the rows for watering.

First Verse

First Verse

“It is because of God that you are in Christ Jesus. He became wisdom from God for us. This means that He made us righteous and holy, and He delivered us.” 1 Corinthians 1:30

When the fingernail clouds arise from the west
and the air is still with laughter on its breath
don’t give way, don’t give in, don’t question the moment,
don’t give way to the how or the when; just wait for the rain
as you have time and again.