Gethsemanean Dirt

Whatever it had once been, it was now merely dirt— one small sampling of decayed life, groaning after glory— and not the marble men require for the tread of kings. It lay where it fell, gave its last strength to the olive, took the weight and kicks of common feet. And when the Lord came— […]

It Could Have Been Sold

Ruined alabaster and a year’s worth of labor dripping off Jesus‘ feet— wasted— and all while people starve to death! So the loveless look on love and see but fault. But Love knows love— hears the echos of Himself in shattering stone, feels His own heartbeat in oil running down: it is a gift, and […]

The Man

Long the war had torn the world apart with souls the casualties and souls the cause. The enemy ensconced and great in art made war the hope, and hopeless doom the laws. Silent lay the prophets’ dusty truths that glittered once like lanterns in a mine. The wise men slept in silence while the youths […]

Christ the Great Exalted

Christ now raised and seated high, reigning Great Exalted, Lord of Light who hope supplied: life when death assaulted, Savior over sin and gloom Mystery of redemption, lead us to the empty tomb turn our gaze to heaven. – Shameless one you shared our shame lamb of God forsaken! Blameless Son You wore our blame: […]

The Song of the Garden

It was in a garden where the firstfruits of our race found that joy and life was there that Providence had placed. But there inside a garden wall of shrubs and trees and berries all our cancer sin began to bloom The death of light the world of doom. – It was in a garden […]

The Hands of Christ

He had the hands of a man,

grown from curled-up baby hands

to dirty, in-a-hurry boy hands

to hands that could wield

a hammer and nails;

—

hands obscured for thirty years

in seas of Jewish hands;

revealed—man-defying Teacher hands,

hands that could hold

and shelter and bleed;

—

hands, nearer with every breath,

to nail-intruded hands,

to weighed-with-the-sins-of-the-world hands,

the hands still moving,

washing dirt from feet.

—

His hands are the hands of God,

blameless, righteous, holy hands,

the died-and-lives-forever hands,

the hands that welcome

sinners into life.

Till the End

No darkness, no cross, no death-wound of heart could keep Christ from his friends. They ate and talked and sang and slept while He loved them till the end.

Mary’s Memoriam

Broken like a casket box– then waves of sudden cold puddle on the head and hair dripping off the beard. Overpowering all else an earthen, floral note– extravagant, and rich embarrassment of eager zeal. – Lasting for a moment–just the ostentatious show outpoured, and used and sudden–gone. a year of lavished work. Just so–the trail […]

Close of Day

They came at close of Sabbath day. Two solitary figures, they just as the sun had set. Where once it threw its blazing life light into view the sky around; before the orange gild had died away into the silent death and gray of night. And rested there, some place deep in earth, where it […]

This Was the Son of God

The sky resigns; a silent kind of cry that lies outside the mire of our lies and uncontrolled, cannot be rolled into the fabric of our sinful lives. – The sun has sunk in protest or in fears, as noonday freezes sight with night and now the rays that filled our days strike us with […]

melenoria

passion week