Times of fear, anxieties rage
against the confidence given,
Not knowing, but knowing future remains.
In unseen hands our hearts are living.
What if, what will be, what may be,
shaking the faithful to the core,
Awakens with in us a greater need
To know Alpha and Omega’s faithfulness
and his wide open door
to heavenly heights and security
our life hidden in Him.
The plans not known or revealed
as futures may look dim
Ho! Who has life? Where is life?
Not here with dusty feet
But rich with promise and confidence
In Him in whom face to face we will meet

Les Williams

Death clarifies
the startling brevity of life.
Where are the breaths we took unheeding,
the blessings taken for granted?
Praise the giver of life
by living the life you’re given,
successions of light and shadow
moving against the unseen day.
Live every day as the day
before what comes next,
every moment as if the first moment,
hope rising deep in adoration.
Go attentively toward a good death,
thankful; bold in humility
gaining a heart of wisdom.
Living and dying are of one piece.
To live is Christ; to die is gain.
We know our redeemer lives!

DAS

Salvation without money, without price
a story we might read and not know
hold in uncertainty
his unfathomed purpose
When we have begun to believe
the grip of doubt tightens
questions walk beside all that is said
waiting their turn to speak
Summoned into understanding
it seems a frail trust we have
our hearts pulse; we tremble
at the comprehension
In moments of absolute sureness
we sit patiently
doing nothing but be
story too big for our body
We see the one who sees us
that great single eye holding us
steadfast as we move by
singing hymns of pure being
to the faithfulness of God.

DAS

Words heavy with the holy
grip the attention
a language being itself
a tongue akin to light
the oracles of God
Words make his being known
to strangers and pilgrims
words of life
eaten in common
sweet and bitter
Learning to live without these words
is like dying
no covenant hope
no promise
words like grit
Live by every word from God’s mouth
Listen, hear him speak to you
not as academic exercise
not to win an argument
but to know him
His word reads you as you read it
the heart an eye, seeing
his words becoming mountains
entrusted to you
an advantage given
the God-breathed word.

DAS

Beware the leaven of hypocrisy
that accumulates in
an unexamined life;
theoretical argument,
a confidence falsely held
that thinks you’re
on wonderful terms with yourself.
You must take heed, you
who confess the faith, lest
while you declare his words
you fail to live them
and misrepresent his holy name.

It is the mark of God on your heart
that makes you genuine, chosen,
not religion;
not family lineage
not a kosher kitchen,
but the life of God
in the soul, the
presence of the Holy Ghost,
evident in gusts of grace;
the new heart within
the clean, the pure.
The praise of God rather than men.

DAS

I crawl through a forest of words
a cacophony of sounds, digging
for authentic speech
words with silence in them
courteous words
obscure, troubling
incomplete at times
but true
words that keep working long after
the sound is gone; words
I can hear again and again
weighty words
words not to satisfy hunger or thirst
but to intensify it
to deepen it; words that
demand attention
words that call me into the mystery
of God at work, my hand over my mouth
into a holy of holies, into the silence
to the still-point; to worship
Only Jesus saves!

Before the storm, assaulted by noise
human voices warn and inform
without pause
machines hum and roar
keeping food
cooling air
communicating news
more, not less
During the storm, battered by wind
trees break; things thump and bang
against the house for hours
at first light, the wind remains
all hum and roar
of motors still
After the storm, shadowed by
debris; the quiet

Was God in the wind? the noise?
Is he in the quiet?
Be still and listen
in the high voltage stillness
abandon defense
take off the mask
becalm the mind, the soul
be aware of subtlety
of smallness
hear a sound, a thin silence
hear a still small voice whisper
It is well! It is well!
Only Jesus saves!

My assessments are biased,
too many prejudices, a too-narrow
collect of information.
God’s appraisals are not so. He
will not accept the mask for the person,
judges according to truth.
I live in the gaze of that unblinking eye,
preparing for eternity. My works follow me.
He knows everything about me
what I am given
what I spend my time on
what I fondle in mind and heart
what I imagine, desire,
things hidden from you who
see me only as I appear.
Given the revealed word of God, I’ll be
judged by it – someone else not given
the scriptures, not knowing them,
will be judged according to the light given,
their conscience accusing or excusing them.
The reality is, no one is saved by works;
the only hiding place from the wrath of God
is under the righteousness of Christ.
Only Jesus saves!

DAS

It comes, that day we never
thought would come; a numb thunder
proclaims the startling brevity
of things, a divide opens;
wrath and mercy
tribulation and peace
damnation and glory.
Works reveal something of who I am,
condemn or confirm my being.
I believe and interrupt my belief
with doubt. I doubt and interrupt
my doubt with belief – wholly
unknown, except the Son – the
unknowable made known. Blessedness
soaks the ground and its
wintering seeds, ready
to loosen whatever is bound
to a sort of grandeur.
Sense comes into my skull like a light;
my heart cries, “Lord, I believe;
help my unbelief!” I be.
I want to love you only for being.

DAS

Drink truth too fast,
it burns all the way down,
best taken in small sips
like the finest wine.
The gospel is subversive, brings
the sound and sense of the immense,
eyes smarting with the
tang of mystery.
Lean into the words, taste and see,
track the wonder. Be slow
to judge others, quick to judge yourself,
things are as they are.
With knowledge you want to forget and can’t,
walk in pilgrim sandals as the
spirit of each day passes,
ending without conclusion.
Hope in the bud, so much in the bud.

DAS

I am responsible for large things
in a small place.
I am here to blow on coals
glowing toward cool.
I travel with others, breath by
dusty breath, toward a different place.
Sometimes we breathe unheeding,
blessings taken for granted.
We fail to know ourselves, needs
as common as any sparrow.
We think we are not like others,
that we deserve special favor,
a misdiagnosis that blinds us
to the truth about ourselves.
A word of grace clears our vision
calls us to repentance.
Praise, a jewel that outshines
all ordinary jewels, rises.
We get there on our knees.

DAS

What I love to ask
is what I know,
old thoughts that feel
like a well-worn boot,
the things inside me
that make me who I am.

What should life look like
when I live being filled
with the Spirit?
Are things as they are
as they ought to be with me?
Feeling gusts of grace,

learning the limits and deeps
of power and being humble,
my potential heart
every day alive to possibilities,
the way one lives before what
comes next, a story without corners.

DAS