You spread the heavens over us, the earth beneath our feet, and here between the stars and dust we shelter in your keep.
Let not the skies above us fail, their comets fall to earth, but let the embers purning pale keep still their distant berth.
Turn back the terrors of the night, the arrow's flight by day. Let every missile flaming bright turn harmlessly away.
Let every stone we slingshot up be as the snow that falls a wonder, not a wounding drop. Our own destruction halt.
Let earth be as your gentle breast and heaven as your wings, that here between them we may rest on splintered spears and slings.
Bend every bow until it snaps and weave their strings to warm. O Father, turn our weapons back and keep us from all harm!
: Rider with bow (1929) on Pálya street side facaade. – 5 Győző St., Krisztinaváros, Budapest District I.Rider with bow (1929) – Győző St., [[:en:Krisztinaváros|Krisztinaváros]], [[:en:Várkerület|Budapest District I]].}}{{hu|1=: Honfoglaló magyar lovas katona íjjal (Győző utca 5. domborművei) Ohmann Béla?, ifj. Mátrai Lajos alkotása, 1929. – [[:hu:Budapest I. kerülete|Budapest I. kerület]], [[:hu:Krisztinaváros|Krisztinaváros]] városrész, Győző utca, 5 By Globetrotter19 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=53438308
“Hear me, all of you, and understand. Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but the things that come out from within are what defile. From within people, from their hearts, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils come from within and they defile.” —Mark 7:21-23
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You cleanse the outside of cup and dish, but inside they are full of plunder and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee, cleanse first the inside of the cup, so that the outside also may be clean.” —Matthew 23:25-26
I come to you so hungry, Lord, so thirsty I have come for wine that only you can pour like honey on my tongue. But how can I sit down with you when I am all unclean to take your drink and taste your food, pretending I'm pristine?
But you are living water, true, and I an empty cup. If I would taste a drop of you then you must fill me up— but cups, they must be purified before they can be filled. You see the things I hold inside— how shall a drop be spilled?
Yet pour your waters over me and pour them through my heart and I shall have your purity in every inward part. Then shall my overflow be love that water once had been. You clean the inside of the cup— and wine flows from within.
There is no necessary thing in all that you have made— the fletching of the finch's wing, the dappled summer shade, the ripples spreading in a ring from where the herons wade— You have no need of anything, yet see how they're arrayed.
And if the little bird should fall, the world, one sparrow less, would notice none of it at all, would suffer no distress. But you who hear the sparrow's call and paint its stippled dress, who see in death its awkward sprawl, hold it in tenderness.
I am no sparrow in your hand, no ray of light that fell. There is no height I can demand, and I shall fall as well. The only rock where I can stand is you, my God, yourself, who need me not—yet you command, and in that grace I dwell.
The harvest of our sorrows— the bitter dust we tilled, the anguish of the harrows— this grain we took and milled. We leavened it with ashes and kneaded it with tears to lay it on your altar. O Christ, come meet us here.
We long to bring you glories, the bread of finest wheat and wine to send us soaring, and lay them at your feet, to make our best our offering for you to make divine— Here is the bread of suffering and tears distilled as wine.
O higher than the angels, above all earthly crowns, you did not spurn the manger— You do not spurn us now. When all that we can give you is brokenness as bread, you take what you are given and fill it with yourself.
A universe expanding, and every day a flood leaves one more ark on Ararat somewhere that you call good. Yet earthquakes and collapses, both lava flow and flame, creation and calamity are calling out your name.
And all that is or will be is but a grain of sand; the great star-filled infinity a pebble in your hand. The stars burn down to ashes and galaxies collide, but not an atom perishes unnoticed by your eye.
Myself am not a minute in geologic terms, still less in your infinitude— but you have seen and heard. My growth and my expansion, my crumbling and collapse: Though I fall to catastrophe, I fall into your grasp.
As a result of this, many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him. Jesus then said to the Twelve, “Do you also want to leave?” Simon Peter answered him, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.” —John 6:60-69
Could a child forget his mother, though he takes a lonesome road, or one hand forget the other and the work they both have known? You who joined us as our brother knit yourself into our souls. If we leave you for another, Lord, to whom then would we go?
When you called us, we were children seeking wisdom as a prize. We had labored; we had striven, but had nothing for our strife. On the sea by storm winds driven, you were peace amid our cries, and the words that you have given— They are spirit; they are life.
We will stay, Lord; we will follow, though we may not understand. Our desires were all but hollow when you met us on the sands: You have filled us, joy and sorrow; all good things come from your hands. And the bread you take and hallow, we will eat at your command.
George Smith – Still Life of Bread, Butter and Cheese – Google Art Project By George Smith (1714 – 1776) – Artist (British)Born in Chichester. Died in Chichester.Details on Google Art Project – NQGAD2XKLA7c8g at Google Cultural Institute maximum zoom level, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21974529
Shouting, they shall mount the heights of Zion, they shall come streaming to the LORD’s blessings: The grain, the wine, and the oil, flocks of sheep and cattle; They themselves shall be like watered gardens, never again neglected. —Jeremiah 31:12
We have had the nights of weeping and the prophecies of doom, had the days of wide-eyed sleeping, walking through a drifting gloom. Yet the endless springs are seeping into furrows, into tombs: We shall blossom in his keeping like a garden in full bloom.
Some have plowed and others planted— he has worked our waiting earth; sunk his hands into the land here, seed, himself, in death and birth; and the mercy he has granted feeds us like a secret source. He has tilled and we shall answer with abundance springing forth.
Oh, but now the fields are barren, bleaching gray beneath the sun, as we dread to hear the sirens— waiting ended, war begun. Still the gardener is preparing for the harvest yet to come: Even now the seeds are stirring; even now his mercies run.
Jesus said to the crowds: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.” –John 6:51-58
How could the Maker blunder, who shaped us from the earth? We should have been a wonder— his fingers twitched and jerked, or something broke asunder and left us bent, besmirched, for we have always hungered and evermore shall thirst.
But nothing we have eaten has left us satisfied, for, oh, how we have feasted! And, oh, how we have died. We lost the fruits of Eden, and now how shall we find the end of endless needing that eats us from inside?
In you alone, O Savior, who did not spurn our need, but came, like us, to break here, and came, like us, to bleed. You know the bread we're craving; we beg true food, true drink. And you, who have its savor, you bid us take and eat.
German or South Netherlandish; Relief; Sculpture-Stone By This file was donated to Wikimedia Commons as part of a project by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. See the Image and Data Resources Open Access Policy, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=60870093
Kate Bluett 