"God All-Sufficient"

This is a prayer from a wonderful little book of Puritan prayers (The Valley of Vision).

"God All -Sufficient"

O Lord of Grace,
The world is before me this day,
    and I am weak and fearful,
    but I look to thee for strength;
If I venture forth alone I stumble and fall,
    but on the Beloved's arms I am firm
    as the eternal hills;
If left to the treachery of my heart
    I shall shame thy Name,
   but if enlightened, guided, upheld by thy Spirit,
    I shall bring thee glory.
Be thou my arm to support,
       my strength to stand,
       my light to see,
       my feet to run,
       my shield to protect,
       my sword to repel,
       my sun to warm.
To enrich me will not diminish thy fullness;
All thy lovingkindness is in thy Son,
I bring him to thee in the arms of faith,
I urge his saving name as the One who died for me.
I plead his blood to pay my debts of wrong.
Accept his worthiness for my unworthiness,
    his sinlessness for my transgressions,
    his purity for my uncleanness,
    his sincerity for my guile,
    his truth for my deceits,
    his meekness for my pride,
    his constancy for my backslidings,
    his love for my enmity,
    his fullness for my emptiness,
    his faithfulness for my treachery,
    his obedience for my lawlessness,
    his glory for my shame,
    his devotedness for my waywardness,
    his holy life for my unchaste ways,
    his righteousness for my dead works,
    his death for my life.


Amen.

Psalm 145

Not my poetry, for a change. :)  I've italicized a couple of the verses that are particularly meaningful to me.

Psalm 145:8-9, 13b-18

The Lord is gracious and compassionate,
     slow to anger and rich in love.

The Lord is good to all;
     he has compassion on all he has made.
...
(13b) The Lord is trustworthy in all he promises,
             and faithful in all he does.

The Lord upholds all who fall,
     and lifts up all who are bowed down.

The eyes of all look to you,
     and you give them their food at the proper time.

You open your hand
     and satisfy the desires of every living thing. 

The Lord is righteous in all his ways
     and faithful in all he does.

The Lord is near to all who call on him,
     to all who call on him in truth.

Another angsty poem

I walk along the narrow way--
border stones straight, even--
until I clear the intersection
temptation, broad and dreary--
but the narrow road leaves no doubt.
Beyond the intersection
the borders begin to fade,
the road becomes a lane,
then a path,
then an overgrown rut,
then grass.
Narrow road now open field,
flowered with shoulds
and expectations
and desires
and somewhere a right way?
Where the anxiety over choice
dissipates to trust
and secure footing.
Does the narrow path still exist
somewhere beneath the weeds?
Or in this fallen field,
do we just do the best we can
to wander toward the sun?

9/21/09

Two old poems

Sometimes it's fun to look back at what I've written and realize that some of my big questions now have answers. In perusing an old journal, I found two poems: one wrestling with the idea of vocation, the other wrestling with my then-single state. I now feel that I know my vocation, and I am engaged... but I still enjoy reading the old poems. So, selfishly (as befits a blogger), I am going to post them here.

1. "Vocation"

Life would be easier without vocation.
Simpler.
Like slip-on pumps
for eye-hooks on patent leather
or velcro on your tennis shoes.
Life would be easier without that inward force,
Passion,
earnest knowledge that I am made for something--
For something.
Not anything.
A single key
jagged edges purposefully carved
does not open every door,
but some doors.
And maybe only one door.
Somewhere.
That key -- does it know?
the purpose of its edges,
significance of its grooves,
does it dream of that blissful moment of niche-dom --
ultimate fulfillment,
joy?

Yes, life would be easier without vocation.
I could watch old reruns
and eat bon-bons
and go to culinary school
and travel to Greece, and Paris, and South Africa,
and work so I could travel again.
I could try everything once--
a professional dabbler--
poetry, piano, chef, photography,
wife, mother, flirt, scholar,
missionary, pastor, cantor, priest,
Pour out this passion abundantly,
freely, lacking purpose--
A rainstorm and not a garden hose--
in every direction, like a storm
sweeping down over the Rim,
I could be free to fling passion
like buckets of paint at an immense canvas,
and energy at one pursuit at a time
or three or ten or twenty
or none if I didn't feel like it.

But

I am not my own.
Funny--
I seem to have the control of limb and tongue and mind
Divine illusion?
I am suited for something.
Not just anything,
I think.

2. "Paul's Gift"

Will my time come?
My time to squeal like a toddler
meeting her first wriggly puppy,
My time to look at a cloud, a bush, a rake,
and think of him
and know he thinks of me.
Time to live the oldest story of all
before the Fall,
for the trite to become the truest true.

Will I be sappy?
Saccharin?
Susceptible?
Will I know from the start? Will we part
reluctantly, lingering in dusk
as the heavens expand and we grow small?
Will I resonate with radio tunes,
relish chick-flicks without skepticism?
Will my inner clock tick louder
than my ambition?
Will it strangle my call?

That call -- clear as vodka,
triply intoxicating--
will he store it in a cabinet
for a rainy day,
or for his own amusement,
or to bring out at parties?
Will I suffocate in someone else's dream?
Or
is Paul's gift bewitchingly,
perplexingly,
my own?