grace & the status quo #6 (john 1 & 3)

by night he
came
looking for answers
to You
healing sick people...
freeing
the demonized...
preaching a good news version
of the torah
no one had heard for a
very long time.

You spoke of the YaHWeH-Spirit
leading
You & anyone else who would
listen...
who would obey
His Voice.

YaHWeH's Spirit blowing like the
wind
&
You elevated like
Moses' brass snake
giving LIFE
to anyone who would really
SEE You.

like all of us
accustomed to the status quo
he did not understand.

grace & the status quo #5 (john 1 & 3)

Lord,
from the beginning
where You
were busy making
everything from
nothing...
grace in You has always
reigned.

so invisible is the
touch
of your grace
that we mistake
luck
skill
intelligence
(usually our own)
for it.

we forget that
no luck
nor skill
nor intelligence
of our own has ever made
one quantum of
light...
neither have we ever been able
to push back any
evil
for long at all.

grace & the status quo #4 (john 1 & 3)

never static, Your
grace
moves to destroy
all
the death & hatred
we accept every day.

our normal...
is what grace seeks to
destroy
so
life
can break through.

You shatter us, Lord,
then...
You remake us on
the inside
&
out.

grace
disturbs each
&
all of us!

grace & the status quo #3 (john 1 & 3)

"how can this be?"

this is
an old question
to the new
grace
offered to us
in Yourself.

a theologian like Nicodemus
totally
missed it...
how could he not?
nothing like You,
Lord,
had ever come so close to us
before.

you were the one-and-only-Emmanuel...
the God-with-us
Who shattered each
&
every
status quo we had ever lived
through.

You were the One God
Who always accepted our
worship
but never demanded it!
instead...
what You asked of us
was
a denying of self,
a shouldering of
the grace-cross,
a walking of the difficult grace-road...
with You.

grace is
tough!

tougher than
sin & death.

grace & the status quo #2 (john 1 & 3)

the noise of their
battle
echoes each morning
of our lives.

the sound of
grace
fighting the various status quos
of our lives.

even as the sun
rises
to end nights
reign...
so grace rises
battle-ready to deal death to
death...
to free the
captive...
to give a new song
to the
hopeless
all around us.

grace & the status quo (john 1 & 3)

grace
is always the deadly
enemy
of every status quo
in the here
in the now of our lives.

until we find You waiting
for us
at the end of this life,
Lord,
every status quo attacks
grace
with a deep hatred.

in You, Lord,
grace came walking into
our lives
raising dead people...
offering deep freedom to
those held captive by every
dark force.

in You, Lord,
grace became
GRACE
shattering all the
old sleepy
deadly comforts the
status quo
offers.