The Architect

Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people:
“”Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard,
put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press in it, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.
When vintage time drew near,
he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.
But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat,
another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones,
but they treated them in the same way.
Finally, he sent his son to them,
thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another,
‘This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?””
They answered him,
“”He will put those wretched men to a wretched death
and lease his vineyard to other tenants
who will give him the produce at the proper times.””
Jesus said to them, “”Did you never read in the Scriptures:
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?
Therefore, I say to you,
the Kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people that will produce its fruit.””
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables,
they knew that he was speaking about them.
And although they were attempting to arrest him,
they feared the crowds, for they regarded him as a prophet.
Matthew 21:33-43, 45-46

We claim the vineyard of the king
and kill the son he sends,
but we will render all to him
who brings the vintage in.

For all the harvest we have claimed
belongs to him alone,
and we shall tremble at his name
and kneel before his throne.

We call ourselves the architects
who make the kingdom come,
but all the stones that we reject
he gathers, one by one.

A firm foundation he lays down
for us to stand upon
and builds a strong and solid ground
when all our work is gone.

And there the harvest will not fail,
the towers will not fall.
Our wisdom is of no avail;
his strength is all in all.

So let us lay our hearts of stone,
the harvests we reject,
as offerings before the throne
of Christ the architect.

Marten van Valckenborch – Parable of the wicked husbandmen (October) – http://www.khm.at/de/object/d7a84628c0, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=50456838

Jael

You give me no sword for the battle;
you give me no shield from the foe.
You leave me at home with a hammer;
you leave me with nowhere to go.

You say, make the home and then fill it;
prepare for the victors a feast,
for God will be praised in his temple
when all of our battles have ceased.

I stay, but the battle comes to me;
I wield then the work of the home,
for even here evil pursues me.
O God, must I fight it alone?

My enemy lies on the hearthrug
and bids me to wrap him in lies.
Shall I make the home and secure it
when evil within it yet hides?

If all that I have is a hammer,
and all that I have is a nail,
I praise God with all that I have, then,
and offer the worship of Jael.

So God will be praised in his temple,
and God will be praised in the home,
and I will do all I am able
to keep it 'til victory comes.

Jael and Sisera, by Artemisia Gentileschi – Web Gallery of Art: Image Info about artwork, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=775068

O God of Hunger and of Want

O God of hunger and of want,
of every hollow space,
you made us empty in the dawn:
Come, fill us by your grace.

As vessels from the potter's wheel,
so we were made to hold
and shaped, each one, but to be filled,
as you made all the world.

And from your hand we come the same,
all hungry, all athirst
for all the fruits of sun and rain,
of labor and of earth.

Now empty all we stand and wait
for what your goodness gives,
to savor heaven in the taste
of all that lets us live.

O, bless us with our daily bread,
in fasting and in feast:
It's from the table you have set,
choice wine and finest wheat.

And let us pour your bounty out
as you have poured it first.
O, let your rains on all come down
to fill us in our thirst!

The Gathering of the Manna by James Tissot – https://thejewishmuseum.org/collection/26365-the-gathering-of-the-manna, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8849141

No Tent For You On Tabor

For the Transfiguration:

No tent for you on Tabor;
no tabernacle there
where pilgrim crowds may savor
your presence on the air.
No structures; only shining
too bright for mortal eyes,
our sense no more confining
the life that yet will rise.

O Christ, what is this vision?
The Law and Prophets speak
as if they knew your mission,
the end of all you seek.
What is this brightness' shadow
that falls upon us here?
What is this voice that shatters
and racks our hearts with fear?

And then—O Lord!—it's over
as soon as it was there.
The barest hint of glory,
yet more that we could bear.
You were revealed before us
more bright than shines the sun:
Prepare our hearts to hold this
for endless years to come.

Byzantine artwork, c. 1200 By Unknown artist (Byzantine Empire)) – Marie-Lan Nguyen (2011), CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=14716629

The Storm

A mash-up of Psalm 29 and Texas weather:

The cedars of Lebanon splinter;
they crack at the sound of your voice.
The mountains bow down and the shiver;
the depths rise up high and rejoice.

The crowds in your temple cry, “Glory!”
Ecstatic, the wilderness shakes.
You come, and earth dances before you
and revels 'til everything breaks.

Your voice in the flashes of lightning;
your thunder that groans in the ground:
All praise to our God, who is mighty,
our terrified hearts wail aloud.

The trees cast their leaves down before you,
then lift their bare branches and sing.
We fall to our knees and adore you:
Praise God at the end of all things!

Project Vortex – on the fringe of a downburst. Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=408693

Pilgrim Hearts

On the Eucharist, to the tune LAND OF REST:

We search for you with pilgrim hearts
and hunger for your grace.
We seek you, Lord, both near and far:
When will we see your face?

So weary when we took the road,
where will we find our rest?
Draw near to us, our hidden God,
and show yourself at last!

Oh, set a table on the way—
your feast alone redeems—
worth more than we could ever pay,
near your refreshing streams.

And call the weary pilgrims in
where mercies never cease
to rest from all their anxious din,
in comfort and in peace.

The wonder of this aching world
is this, your wedding feast,
where you kneel down—creation's Lord!—
to wash the pilgrims' feet.

So all our wand'ring ways have led
your weary trav'lers here
to know you in the broken bread,
our savior, ever near!

Early Christian painting of an Agape feast. Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=566566

O Eve

Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals
that the LORD God had made.
The serpent asked the woman,
“Did God really tell you not to eat
from any of the trees in the garden?”
The woman answered the serpent:
“We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden;
it is only about the fruit of the tree
in the middle of the garden that God said,
‘You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.'”
But the serpent said to the woman:
“You certainly will not die!
No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it
your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods
who know what is good and what is evil.”
The woman saw that the tree was good for food,
pleasing to the eyes, and desirable for gaining wisdom.
So she took some of its fruit and ate it;
and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her,
and he ate it.
Genesis 3:1-7

And when the serpent whisper
slid hissing in your ear,
how long did you resist it,
“You surely need not fear”?

How often did it echo
on any given day?
How often did you beg God
to take the thought away?

Yet if he did, it crept back,
louder, stronger, again:
“But did he really say that?”
revolving without end.

You tried to tend the garden,
distracted through your days,
your eyes forever drawn to
the truth you mustn't taste.

How long 'til it consumed you,
caught in the serpent's teeth,
until you failed, as all do?
And we have called you weak!

Yet be consoled, O mother,
howver deep you fall,
for there will come another
to enter that same brawl,

and he will sink down with you
to dwell among the dead
whence he has come to lift you
and crush the serpent's head.

You, firstfruits of temptation—
how can the heart conceive?—
are mother of salvation.
Exult! Exult, O Eve!

“Eve and the Serpent.” Plate from Penholm by G. Howell-Baker. – https://digital.cincinnatilibrary.org/digital/collection/p16998coll21/id/38116/rec/1, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=104281987

Temptations

For the First Sunday of Lent, and the temptation in the desert:

We do not live on bread alone,
but by the word of God—
a feast that may as well be stones,
if words are all our food.

O Christ into the desert led,
and there how sorely tried,
you give us both the Word and bread,
and we are satisfied.

We shall not test you, Lord our God,
demanding signs and works,
but strike the rock with Moses' rod
or we shall die of thirst.

And so we strike you, saving Lord,
to test this love divine.
You give us water—what is more,
you turn it into wine.

Yes, we shall worship God alone,
and him alone we'll serve.
If we should kneel before his throne,
it's more than we deserve.

So, Master, you should say to us, 
“Serve me, so I can eat.”
Instead, you look upon our dust
and kneel to wash our feet.

Yes, you, who made us, know our strength,
our weakness and desires.
What we would chase to find but death,
you turn into new life.

The temptation of Christ by Tobias Verhaecht – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=114470497

There Is a Light That Shines On Me

For when reading a Sister Wendy meditation on Rembrandt’s Return of the Prodigal Son gets you thinking about Psalm 139:

O God, you see into my heart;
you plumb the marrow of my bones.
You hear my silences afar;
all of my words you first have known.
When I rise up or sink to sleep,
there is a light that shines on me.

Ere I had seen the light of day
or stars afire in midnight gloom,
before I walked, you wrote my ways
who sculpted me within the womb,
and anywhere those ways may lead,
there is a light that shines on me.

Where can I go?  Where can I hide?
Where is there darkness deep enough?
The night is open to your eyes,
the shadows pierced through by your love.
What though I dive beyond the sea,
there is a light that shines on me.

When I run open-armed to death
and turn from all that love can do,
you wait for me with bated breath
and draw me softly back to you.
That in the end, wheree'er it be,
there's still a light that shines on me.

Return of the Prodigal Son By Rembrandt – 5QFIEhic3owZ-A — Google Arts & Culture, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22353933

Dust Has Turned its Back

Even now, says the LORD,
return to me with your whole heart,
with fasting, and weeping, and mourning;
Rend your hearts, not your garments,
and return to the LORD, your God.
Joel 2:12-18

See, dust has turned its back on dust,
has broken limbs and broken trust—
but will return, as all things must,
for dust comes ever back to dust.

But even now, let dust return;
let arrogance to ashes burn,
the joyous with the grieving mourn,
for all alike to dust return.

The trumpet sound! Proclaim a fast,
the first as hungry as the last.
The hoarded seed now sow broadcast,
for harvest day is coming fast.

Reap it before that sun has set
to feed your foes and pay the debt
for all the pain your sin begets,
and join the feast your Savior set.

For there shall all the last be first 
to fill their hunger, sate their thirst.
The best shall sit beside the worst.
For all alike shall Christ be first.

Then come to him: Become the last.
Lay down your pride; begin the fast
before another day has passed,
before the feast begins at last.

Ash Wednesday by Carl Spitzweg: the end of Carnival By Carl Spitzweg – The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=159077