CONVERSATION
A Poem for the Church
.
RELIGION:
What we don’t understand,
Let’s judge, let’s judge
After all it’s so different from us
We know the way,
The path is laid out
And follow it you must
.
Let us teach, let us teach
Far and wide, one and all
Let us teach the way we should go
For others must learn
The way we have learned
And take on our burdens of woe
.
We look with concern
We peer with disdain
Mistakes and false notions are clear
If only they’d listen
Just listen to us
They could follow our way without fear
.
But they are too foolish, too foolish indeed
Our plain truth to see and submit
We have explained and explained, explained and explained
(For the Spirit they cannot yet hear)
We know the way and we see all so clear
How insulting when they turn away
.
We see each one’s errors
Their prisons of sin
The temperaments holding them sway
We could tell them the way
The way out of it all
If only they’d trust us, obey
.
ABANDONMENT:
We love you, Kind Friend, we hear what you say
But we must out and away
To the Spirit of God who calls us and yearns
To the joy of abiding in Him
For in you, in you we cannot abide
We must abide in Him
.
Please come if He woos you to run in this way
But, if not, pray believe that it’s true
That we hear Him and answer His call to the dance
Please wish us Godspeed and adieu
For the Spirit of God calls us out to this dance
In the moonlight, on the heather, in the snow
To run, wild and free, after Him, after Him
To run wild and free after Him
.
His burden’s so light; His FRUIT is so free,
Untrammeled, uncontrolled by men:
Not in the darkling city, oppressed
Not in the alchemist’s lab, debased….
(Through logic, planning, goodsense)
But in the free flow of the dance
Wherever His Spirit would lead
For Jesus Christ is liberty!
.
Whosoever will, the invitation reads
Dressed in His clothing, all white and pure
As the dance winds its way o’er meadow and hill
Thousands arise from the sand
Leaping with joy, they join in the dance
The fruit, eternity’s prisoners unbound
.
Dear friend, if you hear this,
If your heart leaps on high,
Lay down the burden of pride
Cast all your cares, your burdens on Him
Let His love and His joy your heart guide
.
Then springs the fruit forth
Straight from the earth
For Hope is the sunshine, Love is the rain,
Trust is the most fertile ground
Joy the harvester of the white fields
For whose harvest Jesus was slain
Kaylyn Turner April 25, 1993
.
POEM COMMENTARY by Kaylyn:
The references to temperament and the melancholy temperament refer to a specific church that used the Temperament Theory as a way of categorizing people. Prophets were dismissed as being of a Melancholy Temperament!
There is a reference to an ALCHEMIST’S lab. Alchemy was the search for a way of turning a cheap base metal into gold. They wanted to obtain true gold through artificial means in order to avoid paying the price for gold. This unsuccessful search lasted several centuries.
I believe what is meant here is that the spiritual alchemist (religion, the institutional church) searches for a way of producing gold (fruit-salvation of the lost) through base metal (works and the efforts of men) to avoid paying the price (laying down of self) for true gold. This search has also lasted several centuries.
In this metaphor, gold is the fruit (salvation of the lost). The base metal is various systems of works and ministry: planning, logic, good sense. Of course, just as in the natural world where gold is only created by God who does it all, we can discover gold through following Him, but we can’t control it or produce it. And we must pay the huge price of completely laying down ourselves, being broken; we must be willing to take up the cross and for that our hands must be empty of self: our plans and desires even for the good things, e.g., a plan to produce fruit for God. It is this price that the church is unwilling to pay: being consumed by Him.
I believe, for this reason that the judgment of God is falling on America more because of the self-righteous actions of the church than the horrific sins of the lost and destroyed.
Leave a comment
Comments 0