Long before her son’s whirling and untimely demise, my paternal grandmother believed in her traction with elected officials. I remembered this belief upon my first campaign, which was, parenthetically, about the loss of a single child and an unjust judge.
Who save me
would draw a line between Mamaw and the rise and fall of Hasmonean kings?
Amidst all this talk of unjust judges and rising kings
I tell myself there must be
sycamores in Jerichos still
Awaiting His return
I believe that
Raccoons see you as the Mama Raccoon
Dogs see you as their alpha
But I see you at the head of the old stone table
A wry look on your face
As though I could ever be
More than your little girl, oh
God of the Universe
You spread out this invitation
To partake in your matchless
grace
The old woman and the older woman sit down across a flimsy folding table. Between them there is a plexiglass barrier, the kind you might encounter now at a doctor’s office or the checkout line at the grocery store.
This time we all know we are contagious, right?
They type into complementary machines–one English to Korean and the other Korean to English
Do not forgive these Korean letters, forgive something else if you will.
The devastating depths men may plunge to
If the womenfolk fail to speak.
I told myself I would
Swim the coldest days
Knowing the river runs
Warmer than the air making it
Rise in Holy Ghost waves
I turn to watch the tide
Tell me you remember
Every day you stayed with me
When all the cool kids
Left town
Ephesians 5:13 NIV
[13] But everything exposed by the light becomes visible—and everything that is illuminated becomes a light.
Become light, old man,
Let us all become light
The little boy in the picture wore the most adorable overalls
And brand-spanking-new shoes
He approached the chicken in the unfamiliar garden
With the utmost deference,
The pears still hung on the trees, each carefully wrapped in old newspapers to shield them from pestilence
An unseasonably warm day to worship one’s ancestors and
The food at the restaurant was good
Something about historically accurate food
In the last few moments before
The two little red-headed children
Reported
All they saw–aggressor-accomplice-victim
The little boy in the picture wore the most adorable overalls
He walks into every room looking for someone who might comprehend
what it is
he has seen and heard
He weighs their solemn waiting-room-faces
Do they have
Better memories now? Do they still need to write things down or
Know every word by heart?
Are all the lambs among them and
can we see their scars?
Who can end this waiting
By calling us out
Out into life
Around Thanksgiving I got Covid. I work in a doctor’s office, so eventually all of our staff got the disease as did our immediate family.
Symptoms and severity sorted out by age. The youngest two had the mildest symptoms, the oldest–me, ended up in the ER for a day, facing a diagnosis of damage to my heart and lungs.
First, let me say, that I am mending. I am the recipient of miracles and healing.
But the 24 hours leading up to the ER visit were really scary. The day in the ER was a gift. The oxygen machine they sent me home with was a gift.
And my current pulse, O2 stats, and general health–belong to the grace of my Ransomer.
Jesus gave me miracles, as He has done my whole life.
Covid is a really scary disease. It leaves some scars. It leaves fear and memory of the pain and uncertainty.
But Jesus is bigger than mountains. Jesus is bigger than tiny killer viral agents.
And Jesus never walks away from us.
I know I have been saved and given the gift of my life back.
I will do what I can to praise the One who saved me.
And I will use these beautiful lungs to pray for all of us.
That we feel him there with us,
No matter what.
I have been waging a Sisyphean campaign to draw scrutiny to a large business deal.
One of the companies involved has clearly secular goals which are in frank opposition to the stated identity of the other.
The other bears the name of a good friend of mine. My best friend–
It troubles me that in recent years this second company seems to be more concerned with monetary transactions than honoring the name applied to its legal entity.
It is a good reminder for me–if I want to mark my life, my identity, my business, my things, with the name of my Beloved, well
I better make sure
They all really belong to Him
And we both know
He is my best friend, my boss, my king
Savior, Redeemer, Lord
God’s strong right arm.
Revelation 12:17 NIV
[17] Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus.
