tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-278821342024-03-13T04:49:38.366-06:00Dirty ShameThere are cars and trucks parked outside the Dirty Shame when I go past - mostly trucks - and it looks warm and inviting, a glow in the night woods.
- Rick BassJohnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.comBlogger624125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-27270983594813235942011-05-29T11:17:00.000-06:002011-05-29T11:17:03.854-06:00Shutting Down...You probably noticed a different look here, like somebody was messing about with things, moving boxes outside, setting them on the porch and stuff. That's me. I've decided to shut down the Dirty Shame...its time. I wrote a few words on Facebook the other day about doing something surprising, maybe even startling. Well, this is my something. <br />
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The good news is that I'm moving across town, so to speak, and I'll now be blogging at <a href="http://thebeautifuldue.wordpress.com/">http://thebeautifuldue.wordpress.com</a>. I hope you'll continue checking in from time and time and pondering the cockeyed thoughts of yours truly. And please know that any comment you leave, even if its a one-worder, is appreciated more than you'll ever know.<br />
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It'll be the same batman, just different bat channel - make sense? Well, shucks, this is harder than I thought...I'm about to cry. I guess its best to just ride off. So from here, adios. Hope to see you on the other side...over at the beautiful.<br />
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JohnJohnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-79493013764582030902011-05-27T13:12:00.001-06:002011-05-27T21:11:24.199-06:00Smack Dab...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-k-y6FtyZcCU/Td7Atxw7IyI/AAAAAAAAAWI/NOqOYH_kvs0/s1600/1400317134.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="290" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-k-y6FtyZcCU/Td7Atxw7IyI/AAAAAAAAAWI/NOqOYH_kvs0/s400/1400317134.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;"><b><i>T</i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">his one releases in September from Thomas Nelson, a full-color children's book by Brennan Manning and me. Nicole's illustrations are beautiful. I really think you'll like this one. Its a good story to read to a child, or to read to the child within. Again, I'll share more as time grows closer...its available for pre-order from all the usual suspects. </span></b></span>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-12680247830682006042011-05-24T20:09:00.000-06:002011-05-24T20:09:21.548-06:00All Is Grace...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-T0rkqEyO4Lk/Tdwdifb6SRI/AAAAAAAAAWE/qGrEnpEm5q0/s1600/9781434764188_HI.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-T0rkqEyO4Lk/Tdwdifb6SRI/AAAAAAAAAWE/qGrEnpEm5q0/s400/9781434764188_HI.jpg" width="257" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>S</i></b></span>ometimes a writer finds himself a part of something much larger than a book...he looks up and wonders 'what kind of story have I fallen into?' Such was my experience working with Brennan Manning on his new book. It releases this October from David C. Cook Publishers. You can pre-order on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, et al. As time grows closer, I'll share a little more, do what I can...but for now the cover and title - </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><i>All Is Grace: A Ragamuffin Memoir </i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">- are sufficient.</span><i> </i></b></span></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-89547456804779245762011-05-23T06:17:00.000-06:002011-05-23T06:17:28.776-06:00The Saturday That Was...'I don't know where we went wrong other than that we obviously don't understand the Scriptures in the way that we should.'<br />
- Tom Evans, board member of Family Radio<br />
<br />
<i>Maybe</i> - its one of the most beautiful words in our language. Its a word that keeps us just a little off balance and possibly just a little humble, if we'll let it. Was Harold Camping wrong about May 21st? Well, <i>maybe</i>...I thought about this yesterday because I kept seeing/hearing/reading jeers. My opinion is even the faithful who said 'no one knoweth the day, Harold' still said it with a grin of 'see, I told you so.' Its fairly easy for the right hand to feign concern for those folks who gave up their life savings, while at the same time the left waves them away as 'moe-rons.' Most of how we feel, one way or the other, about Saturday hinges on a literalism; it didn't happen in the literal way we think it will or thought it would. But what if (three more beautiful words) something happened just a little less trumpet-blasting-sky-splitting-wish-we'd-all-been-ready style?<br />
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I'm not a theologian nor do I play one on tv, but I wonder if <i>maybe</i> seeds were planted on Saturday that will take time to bud? Sure, God could just start beaming believers up to the Spirit in the sky...or God could drop a seed of discontent in the mind of a man or woman or child, a seed that would sprout a root of bitterness for the jeering ways of this world, a root that would wrap itself 'round that man or woman or child's thoughts to the extent they would live in this world but not of it. Is that the rapture as we and Harold and co. see it? I doubt it. That's not very literal. That sounds all quiet and hidden and subversive, like the sorta thing God might do...<i>maybe</i>.<br />
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Sure, God could line us up, one by no-one-righteous-one, flash the story of our lives on a jumbotron for all the world to see, then finger the lines in an oversized Book of Life to see if our name's written down...or <i>maybe</i> God could ordain a day, any day I guess, <i>maybe</i> even a day like May 21st, as the end-of-tarrying, and allow us to judge ourselves...in other words, its within God's parameters to let the way we faithed, hoped, and loved on Saturday to be our best shot. Am I saying we oughta live every day like its our last? Well, I prefer to encourage living every day like its your first, but yes, that is the gist. If we were judged by how Saturday went, how'd we do? Was spending the day online holier than standing on a hillside with suitcase in hand? That gets a little fuzzy for me.<br />
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But isn't there then a sentencing after the judgement, where we're all revealed as either sheep or goats? What if Saturday was judgement day and now we're living out our sentencing here on earth...that God's letting us feed in the green pastures a little longer or butt our horns against the gate a few more days. Then again, it may one day be revealed we're neither sheep nor goats but pigs and God decided to let us wallow in it. Not a very literal judgement, huh? But something along those lines could happen...<i>maybe</i>.<br />
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The dearth of imagination in our collective faith never ceases to amaze me...as does the short leash of mercy we extend one to another. Oink.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bhoqvNrX-CU/TdpP6JGQC4I/AAAAAAAAAWA/rcmtKZTIx6k/s1600/pignmud.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="236" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bhoqvNrX-CU/TdpP6JGQC4I/AAAAAAAAAWA/rcmtKZTIx6k/s320/pignmud.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-4691613589081537042011-05-18T12:52:00.000-06:002011-05-18T12:52:45.611-06:00More Is More✠<br />
The yellow box clearly states<br />
'At Triscuit, we believe less is more.'<br />
If that's true, then how did I<br />
consume all the quattro formaggios in one sitting?<br />
Ah, I see, as the box clearly states -<br />
what's inside is 'a kind of cashmere of wheat.'<br />
Now I've felt cashmere before<br />
and by god it made me blush<br />
because it felt like tracing<br />
the clavicle of a doe-eyed angel<br />
from neck to wing<br />
and back again.<br />
<br />
From now on any questions of nationality<br />
I will answer with one word - <i>Nabiscoan</i>.<br />
I'm choosing to adopt this race of alchemists<br />
as my genesis for they didn't just<br />
'weave some goodness' -<br />
no, they've harvested desire.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-6410940749235799992011-05-15T16:55:00.000-06:002011-05-15T16:55:09.628-06:00Confirmed<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Z7jlCLCEybY/TdBXD1lvv4I/AAAAAAAAAV4/Iu9ihnW4RD8/s1600/IMG_5918.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Z7jlCLCEybY/TdBXD1lvv4I/AAAAAAAAAV4/Iu9ihnW4RD8/s320/IMG_5918.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />
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I sat in the second row this morning as my son, my first-born, my strength, was confirmed in the Lutheran tradition. I had mixed feelings about the whole thing, not that there was anything wrong with it, but that I didn't know how it fit in our lives and as such, how it might fit in his. You see, we're spiritual mutts. I grew up Southern Baptist and my girlfriend grew up Catholic. We married and I was a Southern Baptist pastor for over ten years, a decade into which our three children graced this earth. Then we moved to Colorado as part of a non-denominational church, a painful experience lasting a year to the day, after which we were strangely comforted by an Anglican church a decent commute away and I was shortly thereafter confirmed as an Anglican (nobody else in the family, just me). Then, in an attempt to be 'local' in all things, especially when our kids began middle school years, we joined a Lutheran church in our town and have been found there for over two years now, years in which our son and oldest daughter began the confirmation journey. Our thinking was when in Luth do as the Lutherans.<br />
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Maybe you can see why I was slightly conflicted. I didn't want to overstate this day - we're not dyed-in-the-tuna-hot-dish Lutherans, so being confirmed wasn't this epic life-stage where all the folks from Wobegon drove in...at the same time, I didn't want to underplay the importance of faith steps my beloved son is taking in his one wild and precious life. I've also been conflicted because of shame, my own...I am a rover in the faith, a gypsy heart chasing the God of dusk...but I've so wanted to be constant, steadfast like my beautiful father, but the truth is I am not. I have and continue to pray that my prone-to-wander-ways will not be held against the son and daughters I cherish, but sometimes I get scared they'll one day resent being mutts...or maybe being <i>my</i> mutt.<br />
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Alright, hang on. Jesus spoke to me this morning while I was eating GrapeNut flakes and drinking coffee. He hijacked the first part of a verse I memorized as a boy - 'Do not be ashamed of the gospel.' That's all he said...and like grace always is, that was sufficient. Now I'm well-acquainted with the gospel of Christ, the power of God unto salvation, no problem...but the breakfast epiphany prompted questions like what about <i>my</i> gospel, the gospel of <i>John</i>, the story of <i>my</i> life and my vagabondish days as ordered by an infinitely tender hand? Jesus answered 'don't be ashamed of your life, John.' He who hath ears let him hear.<br />
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So I sat in the second row this morning a man with his nose rubbed once again in the grapenuts of grace. And I trembled when my grown-tall-boy knelt at the altar surrounded by parents and priests and his life was further sewn one-thread deeper into the fabric of God, that vast blanket in which I too am hemmed, as is my father. I had planned to pray many things over him in that spot of time, but there was only this: 'Please God, may he not be ashamed of his life. He is my only son, and I love him so.'<br />
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And so we mutt on...confirmed but not crushed, roving but not unto despair...debtors to a grace unashamed.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-51946608192935320992011-05-14T10:56:00.000-06:002011-05-14T10:56:23.455-06:00Just Before Dark<i>I strain for a lunar arrogance.</i><br />
<i>- Jim Harrison</i><br />
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Many an evening, just before dark, I stand on our back-stoop and pray. By pray I mean looking, listening, smelling, feeling. It is a practice of coming to my senses, a return to that often lost in the strum and drang of the day. It is, I believe, communion.<br />
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Just last evening the May chill took my breath away more than once. I rolled down my sleeves and snapped my cuffs, for I am not a portly man. I closed my eyes as the coal train clattered by, that iron-linked-sausage bringing warmth to late spring nights. I recently read a man's thoughts about trains being confining and single-destinationed. He felt compelled to make trains a spiritual metaphor and found them wanting. Praying on my stoop, just before dark, saves me from such nincompoopery.<br />
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The wind whipped 'round and my nose burned with the fresh dung dropped by the dog who lives with us. The house catty-corner to us is empty with a hint of the burlesque. All the shades are hiked up like skirts revealing two stories of empty, all a tease. But houses aren't metaphors. They need people in them, and maybe dogs too.<br />
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The clouds to the north resembled my mother's mashed potatoes, lumpy and lush. The sun's swan-song was ladling salmon-blood gravy over them, a combination that made me feel like a boy and miss home. How quickly my childhood stirs. From my stooped-vantage point the single crow appeared to be birthed right out of the train car, an ashen phoenix rising black as coal. All this sensed against a denim sky.<br />
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Then my daughter's voice - <i>Dad, aren't you cold? </i><br />
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I said <i>yes</i>, a variation of <i>amen</i>, then stepped back over the threshold into a kitchen warmed by love and coal.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-wtNDDSVxldE/Tc6yMcCpt8I/AAAAAAAAAV0/bvM3Pn75LDI/s1600/350_Tucson_Mountains_Sunset.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-wtNDDSVxldE/Tc6yMcCpt8I/AAAAAAAAAV0/bvM3Pn75LDI/s320/350_Tucson_Mountains_Sunset.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-12271912030760108032011-05-11T22:02:00.000-06:002011-05-13T07:21:18.350-06:00Rupture'Beyond the shadow of a doubt, May 21 will be the date of the Rapture...'<br />
- Harold Camping<br />
~~~<br />
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I do not live beyond doubt's shadow,<br />
but I still believe.<br />
So I bought a horsehair belt,<br />
an outward sign of my inward hope<br />
in the Rupture -<br />
that day the sky will cease its falling<br />
as bluebells thrust up to horses' bridles,<br />
that day creeks born of April snowmelt<br />
will swell and not grow weary,<br />
that day heaven will come up<br />
and poets will leave off rhyme<br />
in favor of clover's perfume,<br />
that day roses will no longer<br />
need rain as the tears of men<br />
will do just fine.<br />
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For the last good country to<br />
shed the husk of fear<br />
the Rupture must occur, that broken<br />
and blessed day rising toward our soles.<br />
So I gird myself with a horsehair belt<br />
and fix my eyes on the ground,<br />
for behold, no man knows and some don't doubt,<br />
but this fool still believes.<br />
<br />
(for Winn)<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-UoeKmjulXSA/TcvClfLg3MI/AAAAAAAAAVw/KUdCp-xJ2GA/s1600/blue-bells.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-UoeKmjulXSA/TcvClfLg3MI/AAAAAAAAAVw/KUdCp-xJ2GA/s400/blue-bells.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-79137894138200716962011-05-05T09:09:00.000-06:002011-05-05T09:09:44.669-06:00From One Far Away...She's getting the hang of email.<br />
Oh she still prefers a phone call,<br />
well actually she aches for 'in the flesh'<br />
but we're so far away now.<br />
She rarely begins a thread,<br />
rather she replies to one I've started,<br />
sometimes months ago,<br />
just tacking on a hem -<br />
<i>how are the kids?</i> or <i>your dad and I are fine</i><br />
or<i> we're proud of you.</i><br />
<br />
I've noticed a signature closing evolve,<br />
sort of a finding-her-electronic-voice.<br />
Now she always signs off <i>Hugs, Mom</i>.<br />
<i>Hugs</i> - akin to the Norwegian <i>hugga</i><br />
meaning 'to soothe or console.'<br />
Of late I've dreamt her an Old Norse mother<br />
wrapped in reindeer hide, bent at the keyboard,<br />
war-worn hands faithfully weaving<br />
that two-word warmth, that telling affection<br />
for those so far away now...<i>Hugs, Mom</i>.Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-16140794818198240162011-05-03T07:46:00.000-06:002011-05-03T07:46:37.715-06:00Now git... Blue Duck smiled. "I raped women and stole children and burned houses and shot men and run off horses and killed cattle and robbed who I pleased, all over your territory, ever since you been a law," he said. "And you never even had a good look at me until today. I don't reckon you would have killed me."<br />
"He would have killed you," Call said, annoyed by the man's insolent tone. "Or I would have, if need be."<br />
- Larry McMurtry, <i>Lonesome Dove</i><br />
<i><br />
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"Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but give place unto wrath: for it is written, 'Vengeance is mine; I will repay', saith the Lord."<br />
- the Lord, Romans 12.19 KJV<br />
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~~~<br />
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My father raised me on a diet of the King James Bible and western movies. Those two elements were formative to the man I am. Crack open my bones one of these days and you'll find <i>thou</i> and <i>begotten</i> and the theme song from Shane; a strange marrow of mercy and justice. That's just the way it is. And as such, days like yesterday make my bones ache.<br />
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Sometimes - 'if need be' - there is a reckoning. In this world ye shall have Osamas and Blue Ducks, tribulation, that's just the way it is. But when the reckoning rises that scene must be framed by a mercy we the people mishandled Sunday night. Its alright, I believe it showed our age as a nation - still quite young. Nevertheless, even in our youth I believe we can reflect and mature for the next time...for yes, there will be a next time.<br />
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I cannot recall a single shoot-out where the prevailing aftermath was revelry. No, it was always a sigh of relief, a brief mending. My western heroes always paused in the gunsmoke of death with a knowing, a reverence for the weightier matters of justice and mercy, and also a knowing that there is none righteous, no not one. The soul of the offender was never judged, but rather his actions for damn sure. Then on the turn of a spur they walked into a temporally scrubbed dawn, a foretaste...no parades or prattle, just stepping aside so the town could get back to the essence of life - braiding a little girl's hair, planting tomatoes, cleaning the mirror in the saloon, sweeping the boardwalk, mucking out the livery stable, replacing the flowers in the cemetery, getting a haircut and a shave, maybe even axing a stump.<br />
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I pray that's what we get back to today, all of us.<br />
Now git.<br />
Amen.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-19369951480048793532011-04-28T06:03:00.000-06:002011-04-28T06:03:31.300-06:00A Good Man ChargedA good man I know was ordained several weeks ago. He is now a deacon in the Anglican tradition. Following a six-month stint of service among his people he shall be, God willing, ordained a priest...collar'n'all. I'm so very proud of him.<br />
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I attended his ordination ceremony, sat in the back, soaked it all in. There is always a moment in a such a service when a 'charge' is given, a braid of words to both exhort and inspire. I adore such moments, pregnant as they are. I attest the charge given was orthodox, seamlessly hemmed and cuffed with appropriate chapter and verve. But as I've tried to recall the content, I cannot. Alas, it was not memorable. <i>Oh, John, you just wish you'd been asked to give the charge, right? </i>Ah, dear reader, thou knowest me too well. Yes, I confess that wish. Had I been charged to charge, here are the words. <i>Alright, John, but are these words for a deacon or a priest?</i> Yes.<br />
<br />
~~~<br />
<br />
I charge you with a phrase from the gospel of John, Updike that is: <i><b>Your only duty is to give the mundane its beautiful due.</b></i> You step from this moment with scripture and stole a man ordained to the ordinary. Ours is an existence in something more than the husk it once was but not yet the bloom it shall be; in other words, you are charged to the in-between, the middle-class, us. Yes, our lives are sewn on occasion with a texture of joy unmistakeable, the foretastes. But many days, if not most hours, reek of repetition, a mundane rising and falling punctuated with what the old hymn writer penned as 'seasons of distress and grief.' The relief you are charged to bring to our souls in times like these is beauty - nothing more, nothing less. It is your only duty. Give up all other ambitions for the dross they are. <b><i>Give the mundane its beautiful due.</i></b> Bear witness to the truth we so often bury, that our lives are shot through with drama, interest, relevance, importance, and poetry. Live among us, story by story, with both precision and surprisingness. Help us to believe in God by startling us with the kicker - God believes in us. Know this - yours is not so much a high calling as it is a careful attention... you are to be a man of prayer, not big britches.<br />
Once you begin a gesture it's often fatal not to go through with it, so please, for the love of God and us and you, go through with this. The world for you may be even harder from here on in, but most things worth doing are hard. So break and bless and preach and teach and laugh and sing and weep and rage and whisper at the altar of this astonishingly splendid fallen world. <b><i>Give the mundane its beautiful due. </i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">Amen and amen.</span><i> </i></b>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-32311709545948915352011-04-24T06:09:00.000-06:002011-04-24T06:09:05.827-06:00But The God Reborn On The Sabbath Day...But the God reborn on the Sabbath day<br />
is bonny and blithe, bonny and blithe.<br />
He sends us a'running, shuddering and wild<br />
crying <i>He is alive! He is alive!</i><br />
Life now ennobled, forgiveness of sins,<br />
the sermon of Easter is always Love wins.<br />
So remember this day until he returns<br />
and follow him true, follow him true.<br />
The God born on Sunday lives for the weak,<br />
yes Jesus loves me and Jesus loves you.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vkk_flYi0rY/TbQRTqlviuI/AAAAAAAAAVg/Y-DuCnNHGkc/s1600/resurrection.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="210" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vkk_flYi0rY/TbQRTqlviuI/AAAAAAAAAVg/Y-DuCnNHGkc/s320/resurrection.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-80973112767849366222011-04-23T08:23:00.000-06:002011-04-23T08:23:53.116-06:00Saturday's God Works Hard For A LivingThere are those who speak now with authority of the great abandonment, as if they were there, as if they know without doubt's shadow. My question for them is 'Were you there when they crucified my lord? Were you?' I was and I believe it was divine bewilderment: 'My God, how could you have done this to me? I cannot be allowed to die so young and so close to the top!' He was courage struggling for oxygen.<br />
<br />
Then he was finished.<br />
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Afterwards, it was strange, for most of the visible disciples scattered while the secret ones walked into view. Moments like that remind you of the folly of judging the follower's heart. Joseph, Nicodemus, and those fierce women performed a necessary, valiant compassion. Later, I found myself walking, searching the heaven and earth of my mind, trying in some way to restore the arch to the sky, desperately measuring the grains of time that might transform catastrophe into tragedy. But death's pall was too thick, it was too soon. I had followed him into the smoke and fire, and I was left bearing the witness: 'My God, how did this happen? What on earth was he doing?'<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FHV-c7e9Drw/TbLga2B_4kI/AAAAAAAAAVc/-07XNiyO0r4/s1600/rm026+The+Musings+of+a+Solitary+Walker+%2528Les+reveries+du+promeneur+solitaire%2529%252C+1926+1a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FHV-c7e9Drw/TbLga2B_4kI/AAAAAAAAAVc/-07XNiyO0r4/s1600/rm026+The+Musings+of+a+Solitary+Walker+%2528Les+reveries+du+promeneur+solitaire%2529%252C+1926+1a.jpg" /></a></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-46093282033105409352011-04-22T06:29:00.000-06:002011-04-22T06:29:49.021-06:00Friday's God Is Loving And GivingHe was ruined. They scourged him repeatedly, taking turns to catch their breath. It was clear to see they were not trying to maim a man, but rend a god. Then the <i>thwing, thwing</i> as hammer pumped iron and the man previously pinned to the tail of a donkey was now pinned to the roof of the world, a specimen for all to behold. It was excruciating to watch the frame I had leaned against only hours ago. Dear God, they ruined him. They ruined the one I loved.<br />
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As I stood, my life flared before my eyes, not the sum of my days with Zebedee, but those years after the nets, when my life truly began, those three beautiful years. There were short-breath moments during his time with us when I felt inspired, compelled to capture his words and miracles, to write them down. One day he asked 'You like to tell stories, don't you?' I answered 'Yes, I like to tell stories that are true.' Then he spoke directly in my eyes: 'One day, after it is finished, you can write our story. Only then will you begin to see.'<br />
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I found myself short-breathed again as I writhed before my friend and two thieves. Words from somewhere beyond me rose up my throat causing me to gasp: 'God so loved the world that he gave.' I would remember and record those words years later when I was too old to be a fisherman much less a disciple. Of all I've penned, it is that phrase of which I am most proud, for they are the words most true. The love of God haunts me.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-3327600882725011422011-04-21T06:05:00.000-06:002011-04-21T06:05:41.226-06:00Thursday's God Has Far To Go...That supper was the end of the innocence. That's how I remember it. Yes, I believed things were changing when he got on that beast and the pilgrims cheered, but even then there was still the 'follow me' that hung in the air, we were still the little boys dressed in new, chasing after the piper. But after that supper we knew there would be no more parties, no more dancing, the fifes had grown still. His was an evening show-and-tell, a command of how we must dress for the grisly hours that followed, and beyond. Jesus gave us hand-me-downs, blackened shrouds of love for one another, the rags of a true disciple.<br />
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As I leaned into him, literally, I felt the maundy pulse and it chilled me. What we all-too-soon experienced was an appalling succession of bleak and bare, a way filled with thorns of a seemingly eternal winter. What we would witness was Thursday's God becoming Friday's clown. And he still had so far to go to get there.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-45276871942650356792011-04-20T06:01:00.000-06:002011-04-20T06:01:44.384-06:00Wednesday's God Is Full Of Woe...In those passion days he had eddies of tenderness where healing and blessing would swirl and pool. But then there were the shoots. He had raged at the Pharisees before, but this time stands out in its structure and effect, he was at the height of his powers. So many now cling to the sylvan great commission; rarely, if ever, is much made of Jesus' great derision.<br />
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'Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!' We all knew who he was addressing, but each time Jesus named them, each time more fearless than the last. To see and hear him was to taste the wild, a primeval fang and froth that dared not yield: 'You are born dead! You have ceased to be sons of living fathers! You have become contented with your condition! You have acquired a taste for it! Woe, woe to you!'<br />
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I believe he touched the quick of their lives that day. He ached for them to know whose side to be on, where to give their allegiance, what to love and what to hate, what to respect and what to despise. But they stood defiant, mucked-up geese relentlessly preening in a field of mint and dill, a brood of blind bones slithering in a lost city, a grievous long prayer bloated with blood instead of mercy.<br />
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The rocks that only days earlier yearned to cry out shuddered at his lamentation, as did I.<br />
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</i>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-3092338652143858452011-04-19T05:46:00.001-06:002011-04-19T05:47:00.327-06:00Tuesday's God is full of grace...He was taking us on the grand tour. First the <i>Hosanas!, </i>then his razing of the Temple. He was long freed from self-necessity, but his passion days seemed a new beginning with an old theme. I could scarcely imagine what was next. As was his custom, it wasn't a what but a who.<br />
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Jesus waved us still, then sat down and said 'see over there, look at the splendor.' At first we thought he was speaking of the heavy sums many dropped. But like time after time, he altered our vision. 'No, that is merely self-righteous blotches. No, there, her, the difficult splendor.'<br />
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Two coins. That was it. Though her life was bent her eyes radiated the sanguine dream. Jesus smiled at her poverty. He did not approach her, he would not bruise the shapely form. Rather he raised his hand and blessed her as he sat: 'You shall have love.'<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YGPT7Me2rvU/Ta11JBARMdI/AAAAAAAAAVM/oC8So9mVJqg/s1600/fao2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="245" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YGPT7Me2rvU/Ta11JBARMdI/AAAAAAAAAVM/oC8So9mVJqg/s320/fao2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-57954969864963731062011-04-17T22:46:00.000-06:002011-04-17T22:46:47.660-06:00Monday's God is fair of face...I called to him 'Lord, Lord, where are you going?' But he kept walking toward the Temple, and then he began to run. I'd only seen him run one other time, for Lazarus. That story is told now in a strange manner, that Jesus hesitated, dawdled even for two more days while his friend was sick. But I was there, I saw his fury. He was being hobbled by the Father, he knew it, I sensed it, we all did. So for two days he strained against the reins, obedient, but still straining.<br />
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Then without warning, his words: 'I'm going to him.' He took off walking toward Bethany, and we followed. He paced with urgency the better part of a mile, shoulders squared, upright, not a word. Then his posture deepened, he leaned forward, and began to run. It was as if he'd been told 'now!' We struggled to keep up, such was his unbridled swiftness. Then Mary was there, falling at his feet, weeping. I saw him begin to shake violently, and then he wept. Jesus wept. The weeping madman ran on to the tomb, crying desire: 'No! No, Lazarus!' I witnessed in that moment the depths of his enmity with the old sorrow. He had come that men might live. <br />
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His body sunk into that same posture as he ran toward the Temple after the <i>Hosanas!</i>, like he'd been told 'now!' We ran and followed, breathless. As he stepped inside he began to shake, and then he wept once more. Jesus wept again and howled 'No! No! This should not be!' As if replaying a scene, the unhobbled God ran from corner to corner damning the merchants' world: 'No! This shall be a gentle place!' We simply stood and watched. With Jesus' words the prey suddenly appeared, the lonely ones, the lost and wounded ones, those hindered until then. The Lord spoke 'there is still time' and then he healed them, all of them, and they lived.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div> Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-41567113040200518712011-04-16T23:55:00.000-06:002011-04-16T23:55:48.410-06:00A Palm Sunday reflection from the disciple Jesus loved...I could not bring myself to utter the words. Me, the one he loved...me, the one some say closest to him. Maybe that's why I could not speak my mind for I knew, I knew he was like flint now, unswerving. I knew I had to be like that too, for him, for me, for the rest of us...I had to will myself to hold my tongue. Had my lips been loosed, they would have pleaded: 'Master, please don't get on that beast. Please.' But he did, as I knew he would. He spoke to me, once, just before the clop of hooves began: 'Remember, John...courage.'<br />
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And so I followed him, as I'd followed him those brief widening years. His ride was so very awkward. Had it not been for the press of crowd on either side, he would have fallen off more than once. But they hemmed him in that next chapter of the tale. From where I followed it appeared he rode their shoulders instead of that innocent beast. Jesus, to the crowd a shoulder-high hero; to me, my Lord and my God slouching toward Calvary. But on he rode as they brayed their praise. I believe he chewed this cud of words: 'Father, forgive them, for they don't know...'<br />
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You see, it is remembered as a triumphal entry, something in contrast to his cross-laden steps only days later. But I saw it as the death gyre, all of it, from the green of the palms one day to the red of his wrists that soon followed. And if I am honest I have to confess that I feared the center would not hold, that this man I grew to love like no other would drown and be lost. That I would wake one day to the sound of the sea licking the boat's edge and find it all only a dream. And I would be alone again.<br />
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But no, no, no, we had come too far, so I decided to mimic him. And so I placed the fear in my fists, as I'd seen him do time upon time, and I strangled it away and cast it among the crying stones that day. I had to be courageous, for me, for the rest of us, and for him. When he'd gone far enough, he dismounted and turned round twice searching the crowd until he found me. He stepped toward me and placed the rope in my hands. His face still a rictus of elegy. I told him I would see to the beast. He said 'yes, John.'<br />
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As he walked on with the crowd I noticed his hands clenched in fists at his side. I knew then that surely the revelation was at hand. He was not a dream. He was perfect love loosed upon the world, the madman from Galilee.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-73442822144685414242011-04-14T05:53:00.000-06:002011-04-14T05:53:35.795-06:00The Sweet Return (15)Jesus,<br />
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I'm ready for these Lenten days to be over. They've gone on too long now, dragging and slogging. I know the calendar says Easter is still days away but I'd be well and fine to celebrate your resurrection today, this day. What if your people roused themselves and said 'we're ringing in Easter a week early, we can't wait, this is silly!' I'm sure some folks would say 'what, you couldn't wait a week?' Some folks always have something to say, don't they?<br />
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I'm going to try and celebrate today, Lord. I pray that 'up from the grave he arose' would permeate everything I do and say this day. I pray that you would huff and puff and blow this Lenten pall away, and that you'd do it early. I pray that you'd passover our passover dramas and surprise us, not necessarily like the thief in the night, but more like the favorite uncle we've not seen in months who just shows up on the doorstep and says 'hey, I started to call but then thought <i>nah</i>!' and we squeal with delight because we've missed him so and we love him so and its been too, too long.<br />
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Come Lord Jesus.<br />
Amen.Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-27141170915710277082011-04-04T21:56:00.000-06:002011-04-04T21:56:07.798-06:00The Sweet Return (14)Jesus,<br />
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I birthed a baby today, sorta, but you know that. The umbilicus was cut and now its in the care of others. Will they find it pretty? Ugly? Smart? Slow? What kind of score will it receive on the Apgar test? My work is not over by any means, but I've got to welcome the eyes and ears and thoughts of others now. Feeding the lake...<br />
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Thank you for the gift of being able to hear a group of rascals called The Rend Collective on the noon hour, their thick Irish tongues witnessing to the enduring nature of love. Lord, you know that most worship music, for me, has all the thrill of a salad. But these boys served up a dark and rich draft with a head on top...it stuck to my bones. Bless 'em, I pray.<br />
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And for my friend, Lord, you know the one...give him grace.<br />
Amen.Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-85981869901154640422011-03-29T17:02:00.000-06:002011-03-29T17:02:45.372-06:00The Sweet Return (13)Jesus,<br />
I've been thinking about you, because I've been listening to Charlie...but you know that - <a href="http://burnsidewriters.com/2011/03/29/he-said-he-said/">http://burnsidewriters.com/2011/03/29/he-said-he-said/</a>.<br />
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Amen.Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-48403456839426026272011-03-25T07:10:00.000-06:002011-03-25T07:10:21.560-06:00The Sweet Return (12)Jesus,<br />
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It was one of a handful of times when I've heard you, audibly...but you remember that. We'd spent seventy-two hours in the merciless magical of the Grand Canyon, those two friends and I. As we stepped back up over the rim we'd descended three days earlier, I was exhausted, ragged, satisfied, my mind and emotions in a thin place. I looked back over my shoulder at that glorious ribboned tear in the earth and a firmament bluer than blue and I heard you, clear:<br />
<i>Its all love. Don't be afraid.</i><br />
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I remember showing my dad the trip pictures once we returned, the evidence. I would describe the scene then pass the photo for him to hold. Near the bottom of the stack was a snapshot of my face, clicked moments after I heard your voice. My dad paused as he cradled that spot of time and said 'you look happy.'<br />
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Make us happy as you are happy. May others see it in our very faces. Speak those grand words to us again, Lord. The photo quickly fades.<br />
<i>Its all love. Don't be afraid.</i><br />
Amen.<br />
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</i>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-66247792439067334242011-03-23T07:01:00.000-06:002011-03-23T07:01:51.119-06:00The Sweet Return (11)Jesus,<br />
<br />
It was my birthday yesterday, but you know that. Forty-four years, Lord. Forty-four years.<br />
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The perigree moon has been nothing short of brilliant. Thank you for the eyes to see it. I read where the last time it was this close to the earth was March 1993. I was twenty-six then, Lord, married for three years, and pursuing a Masters degree in theology so intently I no doubt had my eyes in a book instead of peeled on the horizon. I'm forty-four now, married with three kids, and pursuing a life of wonder. I didn't miss this one.<br />
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Thank you for my life, Jesus. The whole shebang, good, bad, ugly, all of it. I had a passel of family and friends send me birthday wishes yesterday. It meant the world to me, Lord, it really did. Some of them simply said 'happy birthday' which was more than sufficient for me, but some of them said they loved me and a couple even said they respected me. My, my. I felt like the richest man in Bedford Falls. Still broke, but rich indeed.<br />
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Thank you for my life, all of it.<br />
AmenJohnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00704980791674041790noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27882134.post-91947821885998893582011-03-20T19:41:00.000-06:002011-03-20T19:41:17.743-06:00The Sweet Return (10)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Now to sleep me down I lay,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">its been a Glocca Morra day.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I beg you, not before I wake,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">JesusGod, my soul don't take.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">'Cause there's so much I'm still to be,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">to hear and smell and touch and see.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">If this is it, I'll miss the smiles</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">when walking daughters down long aisles.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I'll miss my firstborn fight out loud</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">to find his voice amid the crowd.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I'll miss her empty-nested tears,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">the letting go of mother's years.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I'll miss the books I want to pen,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">the stories stitched with grace and sin.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I'll miss the jack of growing old,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">of braying <i>no</i> to what I'm told.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The good book says none know the hour</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">but by Your wonder-working power</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">'pass over me' is what I pray</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">come back again some other day.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">But should I die before I rise</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I want to donate both my eyes,</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">give blinder flesh the glass to see</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">the bitter-wonderful from Thee.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
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