A Simple Faith

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A Simple Faith

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A simple faith

That says

I love you

God

I know that you

Love me

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Help me

To love the world

You made

The child you gave

To save it

Keep me

Not giving in

Except to you

In faith

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Let goodness

Not be slight

Or slighted

Not by me

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Help me to love

My family

And friends

And stranger I have yet

To meet

Or never shall

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Pearls

And swine

Doves

And serpents

Not to cast with

Or to invoke

But to be reminded

Of my worth

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You are God

Deserving all that

God is due

But I must take you

Day by day

It seems

To love you best

Your world

To my listening ear

And the people

Here

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While we are here

‘Til there

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C L Couch

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“This Is My Father’s World” is cited and adapted

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Photo by Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa on Unsplash

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Everyone and Everything

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Everyone and Everything

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Our God

Our God

Why do we forsake you?

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Well,

We can’t see you

That doesn’t help

We have great stories

They’re not ours

We can imagine heaven

Get it wrong

We have you

Because we say so?

Not to invent you

But to have you

Nothing required

But a choice

No initiation

Though we have written rituals

And applied water

And

A party

(and why not)

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Then there’s

Metanoia

The changed life

That could cost

Something of mortality

What we think we want

And really want

Again

To have for taking

Like the food

Upon the table

That is

For everyone

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New life

That dresses like the old one

Sounds the same

Tastes different

Taste and see

The Lord is good

We do not eat the Lord

But consume

All the same

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We may break

With ingestion

Live on our own

And what we think is food

Is good

(usually, we know)

Molecules to eat

In such a way

To threaten finite balance

In the universe

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Yes, sometimes

We are that important

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Back to God

Or forward

Mostly forward

Though repentance

Is kairotic

One day into another

Until the day is perfect

With

Perfect night

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Questions are important

Doubt is part

Faith isn’t stupid

Isn’t tricky, either

Have it

Eat it

Live it

If you want

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Then ready for the world

(as is)

With, as we say

Or someone says,

Truth and understanding

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An amen

Without the end

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C L Couch

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Photo by Ryunosuke Kikuno on Unsplash

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And Shall It Be

(x = space)

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And Shall It Be

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Amazing love

And

Can it be

Sing so

For it is true

Take comfort when

We’re certain

There’s no comfort

Accept pardon

When we’re

Certainly

Condemned

Because we’re done

Unless we wish

It so

Hubris

Material ambition

Only

A choice for evil

And the revenant

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For the rest

How many

We can’t count

There is the chance

For faith

And for eternity

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Well,

We don’t talk about this

At home

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Well,

Maybe you should

While you are here

Before you’re

There

‘Cause there is coming

Which should

Be wondrous

Faith

For grace

And peace

And joy

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The world seems to strong

Against

And it is armed

With sticks and stones

And missiles

Sent by will

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Or drama

About other things

Comedy

Or tragedy

Too often tragedy

With violence

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Or the fog

We settle into

With excuses

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We’re not stupid

Everyone can know

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To turn

Gospel-surprised

By story

Grace

And faith

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And don’t worry if

My faith sounds differently

For different

Words

Or looks odd in concerning ways

For habit

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Is there belief

And is there love?

Then all of us

So-set

Never perfectly

Are nonetheless

On the way

That matters

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Believe

If you want

Not like choosing paint

But choosing

Life

This life without

The hard parts

The ignorant

The terrible

The peace-less

Parts

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Subsumed as if forgotten

Like the pardon

For our sins

Some of this is easy

Like a promised burden

That is true

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All can believe

Test the waters

Test the

Spirit

Go with what

Seems to you

In prayer

Is true

And don’t worry about

Eloquence

Or righteousness

In prayer

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Believe

And live

Today

And when tomorrow fades

Into today

Forever today

Forever

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C L Couch

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“And Can It Be that I Should Gain” by Charles Wesley (1738)

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Photo by Ismael Paramo on Unsplash

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The Mix of Faith for Heaven

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The Mix of Faith for Heaven

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It is a mystery

And paradox

Thoughts

And feelings

Words for the hearts

Of millions

By each heart

Pierced

As a rule

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Gospel for everyone

For one

For no one

‘Til engaging

We read

We hear

Interpret

(we’re allowed)

Good news about God

Having been

Set down

By people

In relationship

With God’s spirit

Making a kind

Of ersatz scribe

According to

The world’s

Expectations

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Die to live

Love and take the hit

Joy in

Hard labor

Even for one’s enemies

The world wins

But does not really

Heaven after the end

And peace

Now

And forever

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Though

In this life

Our flaws remain

And trip us up

And bring us down

And we

Are blamed

We blame ourselves

Though

Grace and mercy

Should attend,

Which is the holy law

But

Civilities

Must have their way

They often damn us

Excoriate

Our chances for changes

From

The first

After transgressions

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Sigh,

Too many contradictions

Living near each other

In fact

Embracing

Over, under

Anywhere the breastplate says

For reassurance

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A life of faith

Is hard

Easy

Soft

Rigid

Impossible

Demanded

Eternal

Fleshly

In each moment

Cells sloughed off

Like sin

Perhaps revealing

Virtue

In redemption

Should anyone on Earth

Have care

To notice

This

And those

While on Earth

Then disappear

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C L Couch

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Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

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Devilry

(x = space)

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Devilry

(the passing mischief)

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I suppose the devil

Is after me

In a suburban way

After you, too,

I imagine

Maybe there’s a strategy

Maybe the strategy

Is chaos

Lack of plan

To ruin all the plans

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Temptation, certainly

And also despair

A bright life

Too bright

To cover all the rest

The real pain

The real faith

To get us through

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The real hope

That’s in the jar

After all the evils

Have escaped

That move around

Outside

And try to set up

House or shop

Church or

Place of work

Lanes of traffic

Bars

Or at the store

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More so the aim

To find a place inside

To take our rest

And better

Resolutions

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It’s not a grand

Or grandiose

Establishment,

A studio

With garish sets

Ringed

By biggish cameras

Managed

By phantoms

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It might look like

The nicest place

We know

Only off in ways

We can identify

Should we be ready

And aware

If only of ourselves,

Our close-in loves

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Deviation

Hell

The hell of it

Is that it is a trick

As all the stories say

The diabolical

Looks like everything

And is

Nothing

Maybe sound and fury

For a while

‘Til the ending

As the better stories

Say

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Give in

Or not

It seems easy, I suppose

The wider path

The golden opportunities

The promise of

A winning ticket

While the other way

Purportedly

Is narrow

But certainly accessible

And it gets wider,

Wide enough

For two or more

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Not to moralize

But moralize

One way is always easy

Joyless

But easy

The other way gets hard

But promises

The peace, we know,

That passes

Understanding

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Though we always

Understand enough

For the

Irascibility

(and ability)

Of will

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C L Couch

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Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

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Sometimes Agnostically Yours

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Sometimes Agnostically Yours

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God, what shall I pray

To you?

I’m sorry for my sins

And I mean that

I ask for forgiveness that

Frankly

I struggle in receiving

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I ask for daily bread

That might be

Bread

Or

Something else

I need

Pretty much right now

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And I shall wait

Probably

Pretty badly

While I wait

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Since need often

Feels punished

And faith

Is much

From an invisible God

To wait for

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And yet

Stones for bread

Is inhumane

And undivine

And so

I’ll try to anticipate

Exactly the right thing

Provided

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Sorry

Thank you

Amen

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C L Couch

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Matthew 6:9

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Photo by Dave Hoefler on Unsplash

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Believing God

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I am going away for a few days.  My family is having a wake to remember my older brother who died recently from prostate cancer (detected way too late).  I’m not sure how hotel wi-fi works or if it works or if I work with it, so I’m not sure about being in touch here while I am gone.

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Believing God

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Immortal, Invisible

How much sense

To believe in such a thing?

Like a ghost

We cannot exorcise,

Like love

We never want

To go away

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In something that made everything

And we weren’t there

That guides us if we want

But has an overarching will

At work

Regardless

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Intimate and inside

Glorious in nature

Even when

Nature is terrible

And thus

Capable of fright for a response

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We go there

And shall it come here?

A word

A choice

And we are outcast

Another word

And we are home

In a place with many mansions

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Source of fiction

And nonfiction

Belief on trial

But so go justice

And mercy

As ideas

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Is it everything that’s good

Compelling faith

And then the action?

And is God

The best of all?

The maker, sponsor

Source of everything

That lasts

That’s worth the lasting

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Life

Loss

The spark that’s there

And holding the spark

When it goes out

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Something everyone

Can get and have

Like good stories

Told well

And, well,

This is the best story

We can have

And is alive

All the time

Forever

Gladly for aye

And amen

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C L Couch

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Photo by Lucas Hoang on Unsplash

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certain hymns and verses in John are sources for allusions

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Glory

(x = space)

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Glory

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It’s a Sunday feeling

For those who have a Sunday

To be speaking

And singing to the Lord

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The pastor cites

The shortest psalm

As an invocation,

Which is an invitation

More so a directive

To be singing

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Can you imagine David

Dancing first

Before the ark

When it was brought into

Jerusalem?

There was singing then

And all the instruments

We’ve heard about

That played

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Today is Mission Sunday at this church

So there are connections to the world

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Everyone’s invited

Everywhere

Not as a number

But as you,

You are invited

To meet Jesus

Through us

Not because we are messiahs

But because

We can quote him

Tell his story

Show you something of his love

For everyone

And the hope that the whole human world

Might be saved,

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Which is God’s wish

But not God’s will

For God has mitigated God

In favoring our will

And our decisions

Yes, it’s the reason why

The world is so flawed

And screws up so badly

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That according to the story

Has made us

The silent planet in the universe

Burning other planets

With what happened in the garden

And then

Going quiet

While the planet’s fate is determined

Of itself

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Then there will be noise

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But here is David

In Jerusalem

And there is great noise

Locally

That celebrates

That helps to consecrate

The presence and the symbol

And our rendering of faith

In holy God

And in each other

As neighbors

And a nation

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The world will not know you, Lord;

And nations will fall

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We could wish it were not so,

And we do

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But not everyone will be there

In the sky

The circle won’t be broken

But our hearts,

Well,

They are other matters

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It’s a Sunday feeling

For those who have a Sunday

And take one

Or on another day

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We have been ransomed

From kidnapping,

From the prisons

Huge or small—all intimate

When they should not

Have to be

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The world violates our souls

And yet we believe

And from the ashes

Of all sins consumed

At last,

We shall rise

Who choose to rise

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The glory of the Lord

In homely ways

Inside the heart

We do not understand

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How something so

Cosmically grand

Can live in something

So small

As our souls,

One soul by one

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Then there is the glory

That we read about

And then imagine:

The universe made straight

While also bending low,

We with that

And all the Earth

That knows at last

This is it,

The certainty of God

In blinding presence

That will not hurt our eyes

And the song of angels,

Unbinded song

That should destroy

But will not touch eardrums

Adversely

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The glory of the Lord

Clearly

All there is,

Compelling

As to break our souls

Though it will not—in fact,

We’ll never had been

Better,

Freer,

Then to get

Our next assignments

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C L Couch

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Photo by Christian Cagni on Unsplash

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Pointers

(x = space)

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(x = space)

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Pointers

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What shall we say

That life goes on?

It does

Life goes on

As we say a lot

Without the import

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Better over there

That is the promise

There are hints over here

Should we see them

Should we not

Or choose not

They are there, anyway

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Funny thing

About the faith

Almost in anything—

Nothing is presumed

By our believing

If it’s big

And good

If it’s small

And good

It is there, anyway

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Our choice does not affect

Its existence

Or its offering

Nature still spirals everywhere

And persists

In mysteries of hexagons

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Nature does not predicate

Or faith in that

From that

Or anything

Or ask for

Our predication,

Either

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C L Couch

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Photo by Kevin Bergen on Unsplash

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