King

The king shall come when morning dawns,
a barefoot king uncrowned.
With all his pomp and glory gone,
he walks the dusty ground.

We wanted triumph over all,
a mighty king and strong!
But he is small as seeds are small;
his patience, though, is long.

A king to judge the wicked ones,
to vindicate the good:
He takes the evil we have done
and drowns it in his blood.

A king to conquer every foe—
his enemy is death!
And where he plants his flag, it grows!
Its base has pierced his breast.

Then, with the world beneath his feet
and when all heads are bowed,
he takes his lordship of all things
and gives it up to God.

The king shall come confound our ways,
his lasting peace to bring.
Lift hands and voices high in praise
of Christ, the barefoot king!

Christ in Majesty with the symbols of the Evangelists, stone relief, south portal, Benedictine monastery at Innichen, South Tyrol By ich – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2905170

Duped

Then Jesus said to his disciples,
“Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself,
take up his cross, and follow me.
For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world
and forfeit his life?
Or what can one give in exchange for his life?
For the Son of Man will come with his angels in his Father’s glory,
and then he will repay all according to his conduct.”
Matthew 16:21-27

Take up your cross, the savior says.
Beneath his own, he stooped,
and we who follow in his steps
must let ourselves be duped.

For it is madness, is it not,
to be so crucified?
A folly and a stumbling block,
yet we'll be lifted high.

We fight the weight that comes to us
and kick against the trace,
but soon or late we'll each be crushed,
and we will call it grace.

For there in sorrow and in grief
Christ lays his wounded head
on purpose to receive the thief
and walk among the dead.

The cross that is our pain and death
he came intent to share,
accepting from his first-drawn breath
the weight he was to bear.

His madness joins us on the cross;
his folly shares our fate,
so he could hold us in his arms
through all we can't escape.

Jeremiah By Ephraim Moses Lilien – E. M. Lilien, eine künstlerische Entwickelung um die Jahrhundertwende, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=49628661

Fig Leaves

Then the eyes of both of them were opened,
and they realized that they were naked;
so they sewed fig leaves together
and made loincloths for themselves.
Genesis 3: 1-8

Also inspired by this reflection: https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=114492308223659&set=a.112923281713895

What we covered up in fig leaves
you have plumbed in all its depth,
came as Adam to forgive Eve,
plunged into our dirt and death.
And you peel away the covers
as you tear the veil in two.
So you show us to the Father,
though we've hidden from his view.

Naked came we here a-borning;
naked only will we go.
Blessed be, at night and morning,
all the workings of the Lord!
Youa re working our salvation
in our termbling and our fear.
We're your working's incarnation,
and your own has brought us here.

Lay your hands upon us, healer;
spit into our crumbling dust.
Mudmaker, anoint and seal us
by the dirt you share with us.
Sweet the fruit that we had stolen;
sweeter still your flesh and blood.
Ephphatha! The tomb is opened!
We are as you made us: good.

A fig leaf cast in plaster used to cover the genitals of a copy of a statue of David in the Cast Courts of the Victoria and Albert Museum. By VAwebteam at the English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=26076667

Abba

As an infant babbles “Abba,”
or lets out a wordless cry,
so we wail for you, O Father:
Will your mercy pass us by?
You have seen us in our anguish
and you have not turned away,
but you sent your Word unlanguaged
who once uttered night and day.

Now he lies, as we lie, helpless
in the limits of our flesh,
and will one day lie there breathless
in the stillness of our death.
Where the silence is unbroken,
there the Word of life will go,
though he cannot be unspoken,
all our wordlessness he'll know.

So he wails across the midnight
with a newborn's feeble strength,
as each one of us begins life,
cry as old as birth itself.
He has joined us in our wailing;
let us join our cries to his
for the mercy neverfailing:
Father God, your mercy give!

Nativity of Christ, medieval illustration from the Hortus deliciarum of Herrad of Landsberg (12th century), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31441189

The Word That Struck Creation’s Spark

The word that struck creation's spark
is silent in the waiting dark:
Eternity bound in her womb,
knit into time, wrapped for the tomb.

So his earth in her waters grows
'til parted by her body's throes, 
and he for whom the dark was light
is pierced by one star shining bright.

And she, the good earth for the seed,
has magnified her God indeed:
Invisible but for her love,
he wails to see the stars above.

The constellations dance and dim
beyond the light announcing him,
and shepherds who have left their sheep
now watch unblinking Godhead sleep.

They sing, in words he gave them first,
sweet comfort for the baby's birth,
that child and mother, weary worn,
may slumber, slumber, 'til the morn.

By Albrecht Dürer – 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=60874091

And He Himself

And he, in the beginning,
and he himself the end,
a thread of seconds spinning,
the heaven's veil to rend:
as flesh and blood's withinning,
the highest love descends.

And he himself the sower,
and he himself the seed,
casts love still low and lower
beneath our weary feet.
Now hidden in the furrow,
he aches with winter's need.

And he himself, the spoken,
no silence now disturbs.
The hope that he betokens
seems nothing but absurd,
until the the night breaks open
with cries that have no words.

And he himself the living
is he himself the dead,
calls us into forgiving
with all we've done and said,
into the feast he's giving,
and he himself the bread.

Baptistery mosaics, Last Judgment – Christ the Judge https://duomo.firenze.it/en/discover/baptistry

Ash From Ash

Ash from ash we are;
dust, and dust again.
But on us shines a star,
and music fills the plain.
Deserts meet the seas;
earth and rain make mud:
Christ wed himself to these,
God's life in flesh and blood.

Flowers fade at dusk;
rivers chase the sea—
Christ came as one of us.
O God, how can it be?
Heaven filling earth;
God-with-us drawn near
to join us by birth,
though we are nothing here.

Dust our dust has blest,
frailty treasured now:
Eternity enfleshed,
and every knee shall bow.
Jesus, Son of God,
mercy born as man,
who shaped us from the sod:
Oh, hold us in your hand!

A dust storm blankets Texas houses, April 1935 By Credit: NOAA George E. Marsh Album – Source: original upload 7 March 2005 in english wikipedia by w:en:User:Brian0918; there from http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/htmls/theb1365.htmSource: original upload 7 March 2005 in english wikipedia by w:en:User:Brian0918; there from welding training, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=235911

Be With Us Here

As Jesus continued his journey to Jerusalem,
he traveled through Samaria and Galilee.
As he was entering a village, ten lepers met him.
They stood at a distance from him and raised their voices, saying,
“Jesus, Master! Have pity on us!”
And when he saw them, he said,
“Go show yourselves to the priests.”
As they were going they were cleansed.
And one of them, realizing he had been healed,
returned, glorifying God in a loud voice;
and he fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked him.
He was a Samaritan.
Jesus said in reply,
“Ten were cleansed, were they not?
Where are the other nine?
Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God?”
Then he said to him, “Stand up and go;
your faith has saved you.”
Luke 17:11-19

O God, refusing to be bound
in heaven's perfect sphere,
who took the pathway plunging down,
be with the fallen here.

The ninety-nine are in their fold;
climb down the deep crevasse
to seek the lost, and safely hold,
and bring them back at last.

You left the Father's painless realm
to draw your people near.
You walked the way of all our flesh:
Be with the lepers here.

The hale and whole no doctors need,
and so you came to heal.
Now show the wounded to the priests;
yourself in them reveal.

And swifter than the spirit moves,
now may your truth appear:
For us who cannot see your love,
be with the blinded here.

For we have said that we are well
and do not see our wounds.
We shut our eyes and tripped and fell:
Come bring us back to you.

Christus und die Aussätzigen, um 1920, Diözesanmuseum Freising, Inv. D94111 By Gebhard Fugel – Own work (fotografiert in der Ausstellung “Gebhard Fugel 1863-1939. Von Ravensburg nach Jerusalem”. Galerie Fähre, Altes Kloster, Bad Saulgau, 2014), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32072389

Baker

You scooped up from the garden
three measures of fine dust—
of heart and mind nad body—
You kneaded and made us.

Can bread become the baker,
the baker be the bread?
Creation hold its maker
within a manger bed?

But so it was, Messiah:
You came, past all belief,
to see your stars from this side,
your heavens from beneath.

And, kneaded from the same earth,
our God from God's own hands,
you joined us by the same birth:
a mother's labor pains.

Her body broken open
to bear and nourish yours;
your body blessed and broken
to feed a starving world.

The dust of earth in heaven,
and heaven filling earth:
This is the feast you set us,
O savior of the dirt.

Madonna of Port Lligat 1950 by Salvador Dali https://globalworship.tumblr.com/post/71134594422/christ-child-madonna-by-dali-1950

Mother of My Lord

When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting,
the infant leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit,
cried out in a loud voice and said,
“Most blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb.
And how does this happen to me,
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears,
the infant in my womb leaped for joy.
Blessed are you who believed
that what was spoken to you by the Lord
would be fulfilled.”
Luke 1:39-56

Oh, come to me across the hills
on any rugged path you find, 
and though it calls you backward still,
leave dusty Galilee behind

to let me hear you say my name.
Call to my now in ancient voice
to crack my chrysalis of shame
as something in me leaps for joy.

O Mother of my Lord, O blest,
how can it be that you should come?
But like the swallow, build your nest
and stoop to rest in this, your home:

no bygone shrine, untouched by years,
but living, breathing dirt and grime.
Come clothe him in my sweat and tears
and cradle him in arms like mine.

Not in a page of history
or atlas of a distant land,
but come, my mother: Visit me;
I'll feel him move beneath my hands.

Bring him to me! Bring me your son,
and quicken me with his own life,
that all my days while yet they run,
may hold the living, present Christ.