Seeing Jesus Christ in Poetry

But you,
What shall I call you? A fountain in a waste,
A well of water in a country dry,
Or anything that's honest and good, an eye
That makes the whole world bright. 

*The Confirmation

Yes, yours, my love, is the right human face.
I in my mind had waited for this long,
Seeing the false and searching for the true,
Then found you as a traveller finds a place
Of welcome suddenly amid the wrong
Valleys and rocks and twisting roads. But you,
What shall I call you? A fountain in a waste,
A well of water in a country dry,
Or anything that's honest and good, an eye
That makes the whole world bright. Your open heart,
Simple with giving, gives the primal deed,
The first good world, the blossom, the blowing seed,
The hearth, the steadfast land, the wandering sea,
Not beautiful or rare in every part,
But like yourself, as they were meant to be.

-Edwin Muir (1887-1959)


*Everything Promised Him to Me

Everything promised him to me:
the fading amber edge of the sky,
and the sweet dreams of Christmas,
and the wind at Easter, loud with bells,

and the red shoots of the grapevine,
and waterfalls in the park,
and two large dragonflies
on the rusty iron fencepost.

And I could only believe
that he would be mine
as I walked along the high slopes,
the path of burning stones.

-Anna Akhmatova (Russian, 1889-1966)

"I Met Messiah"

I don't know much about this organization (One for Israel), but I'm enjoying this series of short videos called "I Met Messiah." In the series, Jewish people describe their conversion to Christianity.

Here a Jewish man named Mottel Baleston discusses briefly his personal journey to faith in Jesus as Messiah.   

Here is the passage in Scripture Baleston refers to, courtesy of Bible Gateway, in NIV:

Isaiah 53 New International Version

53 Who has believed our message
    and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
    and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
    nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.
3 He was despised and rejected by mankind,
    a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
    he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.

4 Surely he took up our pain
    and bore our suffering,
yet we considered him punished by God,
    stricken by him, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
    and by his wounds we are healed.
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
    each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
    the iniquity of us all.

7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
    yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
    and as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
    so he did not open his mouth.
8 By oppression[a] and judgment he was taken away.
    Yet who of his generation protested?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
    for the transgression of my people he was punished.[b]
9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
    and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
    nor was any deceit in his mouth.

10 Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
    and though the Lord makes[c] his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
    and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.
11 After he has suffered,
    he will see the light of life[d] and be satisfied;[e]
by his knowledge[f] my righteous servant will justify many,
    and he will bear their iniquities.
12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,[g]
    and he will divide the spoils with the strong,[h]
because he poured out his life unto death,
    and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
    and made intercession for the transgressors.

Footnotes:

1. Isaiah 53:8 Or From arrest
2. Isaiah 53:8 Or generation considered / that he was cut off from the land of the living, / that he was punished for the transgression of my people?
3. Isaiah 53:10 Hebrew though you make
4. Isaiah 53:11 Dead Sea Scrolls (see also Septuagint); Masoretic Text does not have the light of life.
5. Isaiah 53:11 Or (with Masoretic Text) 11 He will see the fruit of his suffering / and will be satisfied
6. Isaiah 53:11 Or by knowledge of him
7. Isaiah 53:12 Or many
8. Isaiah 53:12 Or numerous

Fine China, Fat Televisions, and Ordinary Coffee

My sister-in-law sent me this poem, and I love it.

My Grandparents’ Generation

by Faith Shearin

They are taking so many things with them:
their sewing machines and fine china,

their ability to fold a newspaper
with one hand and swat a fly.

They are taking their rotary telephones,
and fat televisions, and knitting needles,

their cast iron frying pans, and Tupperware.
They are packing away the picnics

and perambulators, the wagons
and church socials. They are wrapped in

lipstick and big band music, dressed
in recipes. Buried with them: bathtubs

with feet, front porches, dogs without leashes.
These are the people who raised me

and now I am left behind in
a world without paper letters,

a place where the phone
has grown as eager as a weed.

I am going to miss their attics,
their ordinary coffee, their chicken

fried in lard. I would give anything
to be ten again, up late with them

in that cottage by the river, buying
Marvin Gardens and passing go,

collecting two hundred dollars.

“My Grandparents’ Generation” by Faith Shearin from Telling the Bees. © Stephen F. Austin State University Press, 2015. Reprinted with permission.  (buy now)

Only in God

The Anglican Church is a big tent. I grew up as a child of Reformed parents in churches who were part of the Episcopal Renewal in the '70s and '80s. Those Episcopal churches are now part of the Anglican Communion.

Some of the treasures I received from that community in those days were the Episcopal liturgy as expressed in the beautiful and thorough Book of Common Prayer, the value of weekly communion, and also the tradition of the words of Scripture put directly to song.

The instrumentation in worship services was simple and beautiful, and the tunes were accessible to a musically-untrained, hyper-aware, internal little girl in a military family  -- afraid variously of Skylab landing on her house, the Ayatollah Khomeini, and making new friends. These old songs lingered in my head and comforted me with the sweet and timeless words of Scripture and the nearness of Jesus Christ.

As it turns out, my faith has been well-placed; Iranian ayatollahs may come and go, but our stronghold remains.

I have tried and failed to find many of those old songs. But I have found a few John Michael Talbot songs we sang at one time, and here is one I want to share with words from Psalm 62 -- the lyrics first and the link follows.

(John Michael Talbot is a Roman Catholic founder of a monastic community, so if you watch the clip you will see imagery common to that tradition.)

Psalm 62

Only in God is my soul at rest
In Him comes my salvation
He only is my rock
My strength and my salvation

Chorus:
My stronghold, my Savior
I shall not be afraid at all
My stronghold
My Savior
I shall not be moved

Only in God is found safety
When my enemy pursues me
Only in God is found glory
When I am found meek and found lowly

Psalm 62

Parts of Speech link

Very helpful link to the home page of Mrs. Bennett at a public school in Shallotte, NC -- a basic list and examples of the main parts of speech.

I don't know her but her parts of speech page is clear and thorough.

Apocalypse Then -- and Now

World events have prompted me to do something I have been meaning to do for a while -- read More Than Conquerors by William Hendriksen. 

I'd already been convinced of a particular interpretation of Revelation through a sermon series I heard many years ago by Randy Pope, which drew heavily on Hendriksen's explication of Revelation. Reading the book today -- which is surprisingly clear, orderly, and easy to follow, especially given the complicated apocalyptic text full of symbol and metaphor -- only strengthens my understanding, and it is also such a lift and encouragement. May I recommend this book to you, if you haven't understood the book of Revelation? 

From Deep to Deep

Sunergoi on Water in Psalm 32