Monday poem- “With fury poured out”

With fury poured out

They say the jury is out
But as His fury pours out
God disagrees…

Nature crafts
With fury poured out,
I sit inside and wait for the weather.
Aggressively beautiful
This rain does more
Than any genius in his lab or
Other type of work.
The rain stops and I go outside,
I breathe in the air
And newness holds me there.
My senses are engaged,
My patience has been paid
And I now hold onto
This priceless precious wage-
The air I share with now,
Too valuable to gauge.

The jury is out
Is what we get told
But with fury poured out
The verdict is gold.

What’s so “good” about Good Friday? (a repost)

(NOTE: I wanted to post something for Good Friday, but I have been very busy this week preparing a sermon for Easter Sunday and written nothing new for today. However, I thought I would repost something I wrote a few years ago as it is relevant for today. Have a blessed and safe Easter… nick)

What’s so “good” about Good Friday? (a repost)

Traditionally Good Friday celebrates and publicly remembers something most Christians remind themselves of everyday- the day on which Jesus Christ the Son of God was crucified.

We are reminded in 1 Corinthians 11 to remember and “…proclaim the Lords death until he comes…” not just one day a year. However, Easter is kind of special because it’s a more public acknowledgement of the importance of Christ’s death and a widely accepted celebration of the gospel. Although there’s no Biblical reason to mark a certain day of the year and celebrate it as “Easter”, it’s a good chance to talk about these things with all sorts of people.

God didn’t just create the world, but in love died for sinners. Perhaps the miracle of salvation is more amazing than the miracle of creation. Salvation is the redeeming, recreating and renewing of wicked humans through sovereign grace. God did this through punishing His Son through crucifixion (a horrific punishment), exacting justice through the worlds only perfect man Jesus Christ. The cross is the most important chapter of Gods saving work. It is the event that split history, the centre point of everything for the Christian because it is at the cross that God punished Christ for our sin. It is where Christ saved me.

Every human alive today has sinned. Most people are aware of it, though not everyone acknowledges it. To sin is to do something with our minds, hearts, mouths or actions that go against God’s moral law and holy character. We are all guilty before God because of our sin and deserve to be judged and punished for it. Because of His goodness God will not allow evil things to go unpunished. Eternal punishment is the only just punishment for breaking an eternal law and sinning against an eternal God. You and I deserve to be punished forever. We deserve the wrath of God. That is why we need to be saved and what we need to be saved from.

As the only entity who is one hundred percent man and one hundred percent God, Jesus Christ is uniquely positioned as the only way that you and I can be saved from the Gods wrath. Buddha can’t do it, happy thoughts can’t do it, ignoring it can’t do it and neither can trying really hard to do nice things to make up for the bad things. Our sin is against an eternal God and our punishment is eternal. We have two options- as unholy people we can pay for our sins eternally or as an eternal, holy person Christ can pay for our sin once. The cross is salvation because God chose to save people by setting His wrath against Jesus Christ.

This is why today Easter Friday is referred to as “Good” Friday.

What was done to Jesus by humans was evil not good. What he suffered was horrific. The fact that somebody who was perfectly innocent needed to be punished is sad. But the impacts and implications of Christ’s death are very good- because of Jesus dying on the cross anyone who puts their faith in Him and follows Him by turning away from sin can appropriate the gift of His forgiveness. If today is to be set aside to publicly celebrate the cross then it is indeed Good Friday. “For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit…” (1 Peter 3:18).

Monday Poem- “The girl named No”

The girl named No

One still night during her ninth pregnancy
(After birthing eight girls)
Mrs. Johns prayed wantingly for a son
To assist her in this world.
Desperate, she dared to offer prayers,
Asking favor of God (of this God who cares)
And He responded with a “no”
And so, after the initial blow
She named her ninth daughter No.

Over the years
No domineered
The family prayer time,
And they became disinterested in blessings
And more focused on confessing,
On making things right
And on fighting the fight
(Less what they could get, more what they could do).
After some time Mrs. Johns knew
That what No had taken her through
Although undesirable at first
Could have been worse;
That No on one hand
Had helped her understand
That what initially hurt
In actual fact worked
For the good of her and her girls
And the entire world.

And so
Mrs. Johns was grateful for her sons…
And she named them all None
And thanked God for each one
And for every other no.

Monday poem- “The incident”

The coincidence

The incident was no coincidence
But a necessary lesson to pause,
To stop and consider his flaws-
The things that need to change
Be rearranged
Or left the same.

In the future years
He learned not to worry about perfection
Or gaining affection,
And to just focus on the pause.

The incident taught him to pray,
Not the words to say
But an honest way,
And the incident taught him to live
And the incident taught him to love.
What a blessing
That his unfortunate “coincidence” was
Another lesson from above.