Shameless audacity
Just go ahead and ask
You will not regret it
Pour out your words
Coming straight from your heart
What do you need?
What do you want?
Who are you carrying
Close in your thoughts?
Bring it all up
Bring it all out
Pray –
What will it hurt?
You will be welcomed
You will be heard
In this place
Where heaven meets earth
Connection becomes communion
Ask, seek, knock
Believe and receive
The Spirit is yours
© 2017 Julie Clark
On a day like today
When the sun comes out
After months of hiding
Behind low clouds and
Sheets of rain
You could believe anything
You can hope again
Hearts grown cold
Could thaw
Life could start fresh
Love could bloom
You could make new friends
Instead of enemies
Reach across walls and fences
Touch hands
Change could happen
People could listen
To one another
With compassion
They could share resources
They could take care of this earth
That has been home to us
For ages
We could choose a path of peace
Instead of war
On a day like this
© 2017 Julie Clark
Every now and again
Life circumstances line up
A great wall of water
A perfect storm
That knocks you down
And carries you away
You and the balls
You have been juggling
Faith, hope, and love
Now amidst all the wreckage
You find a way to stand up
And breathe
You start your search
Looking for those balls
To throw into play again
Without them you
Really can’t live
For very long
© 2017 Julie Clark
I Thirst
I gave it all
My everything
Not one more drop left
Of me to give
Empty
And now
I thirst
© 2011 Julie Clark
For the sake of the One who thirsted, let us not neglect these who are suffering today.
Do not let your hearts be troubled. You trust in God. Trust also in me. (Jesus) John 14:1
What about when violence seems to be in the water we drink, in the air we breathe, the rule of the day? What about when lives of children are taken without a second thought, gunned down on beaches, in airports and by drones taking out whole families? When a president of a private christian university encourages students to arm themselves and take out people of a different religion?
How do we live in these days when politicians skew all decency and accusations fly through the air waves thick with fear and racism?
Do we pull back and hide, stockpile goods and arms? Protecting ourselves and a few others perhaps? I seem to recall One saying “if you choose to save your life you will lose it”.
This terror, this fear is like a vortex, spinning out of control, if you get too close to it will suck you in and down.
There is another way. It is a way that refuses to lump people into categories of other, evil, enemies, or sub- human. It chooses instead to pray for, to bless, yes even love our enemies. It chooses to reach out across barriers to the other, the one who is different, has a different hue to their skin, or language on their tongue or culture I do not understand. It chooses to seek understanding and to bridge the gap rather than build another wall.
This is the path of peace, the way of love, the road to life.
Here we are today Maundy Thursday, approaching Good Friday, before we can get to Easter. What lessons are still here for us to learn as we see Jesus throw off his robe, tie a towel around his waist, pick up a basin of water, and wash his fearful, doubting, even betraying disciples’ feet? This, a precursor to what was to come the next day. He laid down his life for all. He calls us to follow Him.
“Blessed are the Peacemakers for they shall be called children of God.”
There is a way through these times. One deep breath, one step, one prayer, one cry, one embrace at a time. It is a humble path and no one is saying it is easy. Is it possible? Well, what is impossible with man, is possible with God. Let’s choose this path of peace instead of participating in the destruction of our planet.
Undone
I fall into your arms
No life in me to give to you
But like the babe in mother’s arms
I take from you all that I crave
Only to find that what I’ve craved
Is what you all along have saved
To give to me
Love so deep it has no end
In your eyes I see
The hope and strength of eons gone
And paths laid straight for weary souls
Whose company
I am one
I can walk this path with you
I can stand among the stars named and numbered
I can rest upon the waters
Thrown and tossed and calmed by you
I will trust and I will see
The living lights of eternity
© 2000 Julie Clark
Passing on a beautiful poem/meditation I read this morning from Howard Thurman’s Meditations of the Heart. In our over full, over stimulated stressed lives, this is a good reminder. Perhaps a good way to start the Lenten season.
How Good To Center Down!
How good it is to center down!
To sit quietly and see one’s self pass by!
The streets of our minds seethe with endless traffic;
Our spirits resound with clashings, with noisy silences,
While something deep within hungers and thirsts for the still moment
and the resting lull.
With full intensity we seek, ere the quiet passes, a fresh sense
of order in our living;
A direction, a strong sure purpose that will structure our confusion
and bring meaning in our chaos.
We look at ourselves in this waiting moment –
the kinds of people we are.
The questions persist: what are we doing with our lives? –
what are the motives that order our days?
What is the end of our doings?
Where are we trying to go?
Where do we put the emphasis and where are our values focused?
For what end do we make sacrifices?
Where is my treasure and what do I love most in life?
What do I hate most in life and to what am I true?
Over and over the questions beat in upon the waiting moment.
As we listen, floating up through all the jangling echoes of our turbulence,
there is a sound of another kind –
A deeper note which only the stillness of the heart makes clear.
It moves directly to the core of our being.
Our questions are answered,
Our spirits refreshed, and we move back into the traffic of our daily round
With the peace of the Eternal in our step.
How good it is to center down!
Howard Thurman
How well am I listening to the voice of my Shepherd?
Have I been searching his Word for his words to me?
Have I been watching his every move to move with him when he moves?
Am I slowing down when he does,
to stop and play with a child or
listen to another who needs my ears and comfort?
Have I stretched out my hand in healing as he does?
Am I studying his ways to match my ways with his?
Forgiving as he forgave me?
Forsaking condemnation and judgement,
while learning the art of love and compassion?
How well do I know his voice?
Enough that I do not follow the thousand voices
leading me down other paths far away from his?
How well am I listening to the voice of my Beloved?
Peace is
in the centering
by strong potter’s hands
amidst the
spinning whirling
world going by.
Then shaped
and formed
useful and
beautiful
ready for
glazed colors
and fire
to set and harden
to last
my life time.
Coming
again and again
to that place
of centering
peace
until
every piece
is given over
to be shaped
and formed
added to
the masterpiece
called me.
© 2015 Julie Clark
The big problem
of pain or illness
is it is constantly
screaming for attention.
It drives me away
from anything else but myself,
pulling me steadily inward.
This is no way to live
or die for that matter.
I want to learn
new strategies
of living and caring
in the midst of it.
I have a role model
to study and learn from.
I think of Jesus.
His last days of life
His suffering and agony.
He didn’t go inward
and far away.
He stayed with us.
He instructed his friends
to put away their swords.
He looked at Peter
at the rooster’s third crow.
He had a few words
for Pilate.
A few more for the woman
on the path to the cross.
He took care of his mother.
He forgave his tormentors.
He brought comfort to another dying man.
He looked up.
He gave himself to God.
© 2014 Julie Clark
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