struggle – Kate Bluett

Have pity on me, O my God; have pity, God, I pray, for evils trample on my heart and fill my mind each day. Relentlessly they press me, Lord, and put my hopes to rout, that at their feet now I have poured more tears than I can count. Yet though my tears are numberless, you count them as the stars and gather them into the flask where you keep all our scars. My days and nights are filled with fear: Fill them still more with trust, and if I cannot feel you near, yet meet me in the dust. Oh, come, take hold of both my hands and fill them with your strength, so I may fight—or merely stand— beneath the blows that rain. But one by one shall they turn back: They see you here and flee, and when you come to fill my lack, what can they do to me? So you will rescue me from death and stand with me in strife. You fill my body with your breath here in the land of life.

O God, come guide my stumbling steps.
So little progress do I make
along the road to holiness,
yet help me one more inch to take.

Since you have no mown down these hills,
then you must give me strength to climb.
And if no strength my body fills,
do you still ask for heights sublime?

While others scale the grandest peaks
and then descend to holy lands,
the Shepherd gathers up the weak
and carries them within his hands.

He leads the straying, shambling ewes
not with despite, but tender care.
And though they may destruction choose,
he will not leave them to despair.

So I, so often choosing death,
still hope to climb some little ways,
not by my power, not by strength,
but by my Shepherd's loving grace.

And if I never scale the heights,
yet there is one who bears me up.
I may not see those awesome sights,
but I can sip this flowing cup.

Tag: struggle

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Climbing