Essence of I | When Will Tomorrow Come | Sun | WIDZIALEM DZIS | A Pearl | Cheap Grace
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Essence of I by Daniel G. Leiva I am an atom Sleeping, sleeping, dreaming, dreaming |
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Family, Love and the Church Homeless |
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When Will My Tomorrow Come |
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| Every man dies, but not every man really lives... -William Wallace, from Braveheart |
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| "By gracious powers so wonderfully sheltered, and confidently waiting come what may, we know that God is with us night and morning, and never fails to greet us each new day. Yet is this heart by its old foe tormented, still evil days bring burdens hard to bear; Oh, give our frightened souls the sure salvation for which, O Lord, You taught us to prepare. And when this cup You give is filled to brimming with bitter suffering, hard to understand, we take it thankfully and without trembling, out of so good and so beloved a hand. Yet when again in this same world You give us the joy we had, the brightness of Your Sun, we shall remember all the days we lived through, and our whole life shall then be Yours alone." - Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945) from Hymn written by him in the concentration camp, shortly before his death. |
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| Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same. -Ronald Reagan |
The essence of optimism is that it takes no account of the present, but it is a source of inspiration, of vitality and hope where others have resigned; it enables a man to hold his head high, to claim the future for himself and not to abandon it to his enemy. -Dietrich Bonhoeffer |
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| I like the dreams of the future, better than the history of the past. -Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, in their correspondence in the last years of their lives |
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same. -Ronald Reagan |
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I SAW A MAN TODAY by Greg Grabowski |
WIDZIALEM DZIS |
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You are his beloved, the spotless and unstained orb of his eye. Were you always the King's possession? From the bottomless pit, trapped in an earthly shell, the fates swift hand plucked you as curious children to soft sweets. Then, tossed about by careless hands, you were uncovered and your protection shattered in two. Your value meaninglessly felt. So she adorned you by another earthly cage and you were mounted on a pyre of gold fashioned by lust's billowing flames. You were the precious ring flaunted amongst royalties beyond our borders, flaunted upon a gaunt and weary finger. She took you to her banquets where such splendor grows as leaves on sycamore. As you glittered in their ballroom lights, they marveled her. She took you to her bed chamber and laid underneath her thin covers, you were shroud by her night's revelry. You were worn, smudged on her withered finger. The fall season. So she set you aside amongst all her pricelessly unvalued wares. Till thieves masked in Persian silks and burnt incense purloined you away. One after another they peddled you amongst cold, shrouded streets, behind rubble buildings. The gold studding was spoiled and you were diminished. Unwanted as fool's gold. Down a littered street you rolled under the gates of a pig's sty. You were turned over by long stouts in the mud with their excrement and nearly trampled under their hooves. With the pig filth you were washed away by an un-aiming spray, flowing through the stream's course finding the ocean. You sunk, sunk, sunk. Sinking past light, past life, to the ocean's bed. Undistinguishable from the rocks as the dawn of a new morning came to you as refracted, as broken, light. Oh but the master diver with timeless experience, gentle hands, a firm chest, with a strong right arm. His name is a single word. The first word, spoken before the formless and void world. The humble diver, though he commanded powerful fleets, exchanged his captain's uniform for sea stained bath robes. He lowered himself to that same ocean, past the surface, further, past light where he became colorless as the sea, further, past life, and further, past death. Without hesitation, his breathe already fading; He took you in his palm. You were his burden but you were his chosen. Springing off the ocean floor he rises, rises, rises, rises, rises, rises, kicking tirelessly, His muscles aching, His lungs bursting, his heart straining to the point of death. Into the light penetrable water he sees the bottom of his boat, the empty sky, the light, the heavens. With his arm stretched out before him, your weight engraved on the palm of his hand, you rise. He is exhausted. You rise. Exhausted. Slipping, slipping, slipping, he's just there, his lungs are drowning, slipping, his mouth full of the sea's bitter salt, he's there, his eyes were burning, slipping, and his head full of a skull piercing pain. He's there. He's risen! You've risen! Breaking the water's surface, sound, waves crashing, light, a first blinding power, the smell, the breeze. He cares nothing for them for he open's his palm and takes you in as his first breathe. You are forever his beloved, a spotless pearl. |
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Dietrich Bonhoeffer on Cheap Grace |
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