Christian Poetry – This Jolly Beggar

A Common-Place Jotting: “Lord, It Belongs Not To My Care”

Common-Place or “Locus Communis” — a place to remember

Richard Baxter was a 17th-century English theologian and Reformed pastor whose fruitfulness in ministry continues to inspire the church today. Most quoted is this advice to those in ministry which, given recent high-profile scandals, can use another dusting off:

Take heed to yourselves, lest you be void of that saving grace of God which you offer to others, and be strangers to the effectual working of that gospel which you preach . . . and lest you famish yourselves while you prepare food for them.
Richard Baxter, The Reformed Pastor

Also a poet, Baxter summarized the manner of his preaching this way:

I preach’d, as never sure to preach again,
And as a dying man to dying men!
O how should preachers men’s repenting crave,
Who see how near the church is to the grave?

Turning Back Loneliness

*Written for Paula’s Thursday Inspo #77: theme is **lonely** and the above image*

I’m lonely without You, Lord,
though all the world be mine
the city’s blue-gray skyline
the starry twinkling host

I need to know you near me
Your love-light in my eye
the fragrance of your Spirit
the sweetness of your Word

somewhere I took a wrong turn
I chased my own desire
a world of smug contentment
but lacking peace of mind

I know you never left me
so I feel you all the more
when I’ve turned my back to you
your tender love ignored

I don’t know why I do this
leave you, then come back
as if I never knew You
as if my faith were dead

returning then I seek You
repenting of time lost
joyous to talk to You, Lord,
and walk with You again.

The Promises, the Giver

crepuscular-panorama — Jacob’s Ladder Crepuscular Panorama/Wikipedia

If in all the world I could trust just you
To forever keep a promise or two
I’d give my soul to you, my dear,
With many a kiss and nary a fear
Believing your promises were safe and true
And I had nothing to fear from you.

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Edge of Original

I’ve been on the edge of “original” all my life,
she said, reaching for the top shelf in the grocer’s aisle,
and teetering on her toes, tips of her fingers on the jam
she hoped to coax forward but pushed further back;
still probing, she continued to ruminate long-
windedly while His gaze receded farther from her
who held her origin in His heart which alone knew
who she was apart from the jam, the cart, the grocer’s
aisle while she strained in pursuit of a receding jar
leaving behind uniqueness in the receding Light.

DailyPostPrompt: original

Rebuilding with You

Things can fall apart so fast
Entropy is the law of the land
But when you come and pick me up
I know I can rebuild.

Bits of life flake away
As I go through each day
Little deaths along the way
But with you, I can rebuild.

Eternal God, you never leave
Though willfully I’ve torn apart
The life that you have given me
In Christ you help me to rebuild.

Now with thankful hope I pray
And think upon that glorious day
When in heaven I’ll rejoice and say
O God, you helped me to rebuild.

DailyPostPrompt: Rebuild

The Sacrifice

(A retelling of the story of Abraham and Isaac)

A weary journey, a wakeful night,
They left their camp before daylight
An old man carrying the weight of years
Wrinkled cheeks wet with tears
At hearing the young boy at his side
Prattle on with childish pride
That he alone had been chosen
To help his father on this mission.

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Hope To Hear From You

In the granite of city streets
is lost the sound of hope;
nor on a plain or hillside steep
no echo’s heard of struggles deep
within a heart alone.

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God Sings

It’s not so difficult to believe that God, the Creator of the universe, sings. After all, he made so many creatures that can sing including humans (to varying degrees), birds, crickets, wolves, frogs, dolphins, yes, even mice!

There is singing in all of creation in one form or another, the sounds of nature in the air, earth, and sea. There are those who have believed in the singing of the stars, the music of the spheres as they move about it space.

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