Mercy’s Measure

Stop judging and you will not be judged. Stop condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven. Give and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you.
Luke 6:37-38

Come forgive and be forgiven:
Gentle Lord, I hear you tell
that the measure I have given
shall be guven me as well.
But the meager grace I offer
cannot fill my wounded soul.
Though I cling to all my profit,
it can never make me whole.

Come unbind me, O my shepherd,
from the chains I bound myself.
Come and teach me mercy's measure,
overflowing every breath.
Turn my heart from condemnation;
turn my mind from judgment's scales,
for you came to bring salvation
even to the soul that fails.

Come and show me, Christ my savior,
love that does not count the cost.
That same love teach me to render,
for I, too, am blind and lost.
Oh, how infinite your treasure,
yet how little I can see!
God of love beyond all measure,
measure mercy out to me!

By Work Projects Administration Poster Collection – Library of CongressCatalog: http://lccn.loc.gov/98517015Image download: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/service/pnp/cph/3f00000/3f05000/3f05500/3f05508v.jpgOriginal url: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3f05508, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31925246

Peter II

You said that you would serve me,
the cleansing water poured
though I could not deserve it—
but wash me now, O Lord.

While you awaited Judas,
I laid me down and slept,
but I have heard the rooster,
and bitterly I wept.

For I have failed my tempting;
my own heart I denied,
and now my nets are empty,
though I have fished all night.

You call out from the shoreline
beyond the night of grief.
I plunge into the ocean
let it wash me clean.

You ask me if I love you;
you ask it yet again.
Three times your ask it of me,
as you foretold my sin.

And three times I have answered,
and will a thousand more
through all the years advancing:
You know I love you, Lord.

Raphael, *Christ’s Charge to Peter*, 1515. – Victoria and Albert Museum, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1718074

Peter I

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter,
“Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?”
Simon Peter answered him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.”
He then said to Simon Peter a second time,
“Simon, son of John, do you love me?”
Simon Peter answered him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.”
Jesus said to him the third time,
“Simon, son of John, do you love me?”
Peter was distressed that Jesus had said to him a third time,
“Do you love me?” and he said to him,
“Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.”
Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.
Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger,
you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted;
but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands,
and someone else will dress you
and lead you where you do not want to go.”
He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God.
And when he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.”
John 21:15-19

To the tune NON DIGNUS:

O Lord, you know I love you,
though human hearts are frail.
You know how I turned from you,
when all my courage failed.

You now how I denied you;
you saw when I turned back,
but now I sit beside you—
and will you take me back?

Oh, how can you believe me?
What promise could I keep?
But somehow you receive me,
and tell me feed your sheep.

So I will be a shepherd
and all the world my field,
as I have been a fisher
for all the seas would yield.

Forever I shall follow
where you have gone before.
I am reborn from sorrow,
because you love me, Lord.

William de Brailes, *Christ Appears at Lake Tiberias*, c. 1250. – Walters Art Museum: Home page Info about artwork, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18850975

Forgive and Be Forgiven

But rather, love your enemies and do good to them,
and lend expecting nothing back;
then your reward will be great
and you will be children of the Most High,
for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.
Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.
Stop judging and you will not be judged.
Stop condemning and you will not be condemned.
Forgive and you will be forgiven.
Give, and gifts will be given to you;
a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing,
will be poured into your lap.
For the measure with which you measure
will in return be measured out to you.
Luke 6:27-38

To the tune AURELIA:

Forgive and be forgiven,
and love your enemy:
The laws of earth and heaven
are this simplicity.
So everything I measure
is measured back to me,
and all that I have treasured
from my hand must go free.

O Father, can I do this
and love as you have done?
We stole an apple from you,
and you sent manna down.
You blessed us with your fullness
when we had cursed the ground.
In shame we took up tunics;
you clothed us with the Son.

Teach me to give the thirsting
the water that I crave,
t'anoint the ones who hurt me
with heaven's healing salve.
You bless as I am cursing;
my littleness you save,
so I must offer mercy,
for that is I all I have.

Sankt Matthæus Kirke, Copenhagen, Denmark. Camera location 55° 40′ 10.2″ N, 12° 32′ 52.8″ E View this and other nearby images on: OpenStreetMap Altarpiece – “Sermon on the Mount” By Henrik Olrik – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2980809

Taken In My Sin

Then Jesus straightened up and said to her,
“Woman, where are they?
Has no one condemned you?”
She replied, “No one, sir.”
Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you.
Go, and from now on do not sin any more.”
John 8:1-11

To the tune KINGSFOLD (“I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say”):

When taken in my sin I stand
before you, sinless Christ,
and angry stones fill every hand
while I must pay the price,
you kneel with grace I can't demand
amid the outraged cries:
You write my sins upon the sand,
confounding all the wise.

Why do you write in sand and clay,
in lines that cannot last,
what we would carve in stone for aye
and ever hold it fast?
Amid the traffic of the day
you write our sins gone past;
the wind will blow them all away
before a stone is cast.

O saving Christ, remember not
these letters or my sin,
but wipe away each line and jot
that mars my soul within.
And when I am in evil caught,
when I would stand condemned,
be then the mercy I have sought
and make me clean again.

*Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery*, 1565 by Pieter Bruegel, Oil on panel, 24cm x 34cm. By Pieter Brueghel the Elder – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Christ_and_the_Woman_Taken_in_Adultery_Bruegel.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21830141

What Are You Owed?

To the tune FINLANDIA.

 What are you owed, that you demand in payment?
 What do you owe, and can you ever pay?
 The judge shall come and summon every claimant
 and in the scales each life and debt shall weigh.
 Then there shall be no pleading, no allayment
 when we shall stand with Christ upon that day.
 
 As you forgive, so shall you be forgiven;
 you shall receive what others have from you.
 So measured with the measures you have given,
 so you shall have in right and truth your due.
 The trumpet sound, the final seal be riven,
 and all shall end, and all shall be made new.
  
 They shall be kings, who now go empty-handed,
 and they shall laugh, who here make time to weep.
 The meek shall rise, shall lorded by and landed,
 and they shall live who now in stillness sleep.
 And all we lost or gave when Christ commanded
 we shall have back, and evermore shall keep.
  
 Your treasures bring and lay them in oblation
 before his feet, and ask naught in return,
 for you have all, his life and his salvation
 and else love—for what else do we yearn?
 Hold nothing back and have no reservation:
 You are his own, though all your world should burn.

By Rembrandt – collectie.boijmans.nl : Home : Info : Pic, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30798735

Seven Times

Peter approached Jesus and asked him,
“Lord, if my brother sins against me,
how often must I forgive?
As many as seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I say to you, not seven times but seventy-seven times.
Matthew 18:21-35

To the tune EVENTIDE.

Shall I forgive my brother seven times?
Yes seven hundred, seven thousand more.
As I have been forgiven my own crimes,
so I must give what I have hungered for.

Servants indebted, we cannot repay
all that we owe to him to who gave us all.
Mercy, oh God! is all that we can pray;
mercy we find in God who hears our call.

As we receive, so we must give again:
love overflowing to all those in need,
pardon for all as we have pardoned been.
So we will follow Christ in word and deed.

He who forgave us, even as he died,
came that his wand'ring flock might not be lost.
Such is his love, oh! Still does it abide!
Reaching for us no matter what the cost.

God, slow to anger, quick to see and heal,
rich in your kindness, may your grace abound.
All we're forgiven, to our hearts reveal:
Show us, oh Lord, what mercy we have found.