Swing Low

For some, the big picture

has been so bright and crisp

for so long that we are lulled

into forgetting its fragility;

and then we are knee-capped

by a storm of epic proportions.

Sure, other storms threatened,

looming darkness on the horizon,

but they are weathered steadfastly.

In one fell swoop, the multi-LED beam

turns into a shadowy flicker,

at risk of being extinguished

by nothing stronger than a gentle breeze.

All these years, abiding in prayer

for others, hoping them toward God

with all the faith we could muster,

trusting beyond our own limits.

Now, the IV’s in the other arm,

and we’re staring at the ceiling,

surrounded by loved ones.

May the supplications once uttered

from a distance now swing us

into that prayerful hammock,

letting go to the gentle rhythm of grace. 

For Bill Cannon

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Blind Ear

What happens when we stereotype

and demonize people who

are different from us,

that we don't know?

What happens when our fear

of them obliterates any perception

of our own individual or corporate

complicity in the chasm between us?

What happens when religion

is indiscriminately bundled

with politics and economics?

Watch the newspaper.

Read the television.

See the radio.

Listen to the Internet.

This is what happens.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Parable

It’s a deceptively simple story

spoken at a volume and tone

that are just beyond your

auditory capacity, more at the level

of eavesdropping than conversation.

It leaves the front door cracked,

knowing that you cannot resist peeking

and then sneaking inside to get

a better listening to and look

at what you believe to be an imagined,

but still intriguing tale about

people and places that are

wholly (but not holy) “other”.

When the words stop flowing,

if you find yourself gasping in surprise,

both because you didn’t realize

you have fully become a character

in the story, and because this took you

all the way to people and places

you’d never approach on your own,

the parable has accomplished its task.

If you completely avoid that breath-taking

experience, you can rest assured you have

escaped unscathed, but perhaps, not with your life.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Inside-Out

"Judge not, lest ye be judged."

doesn't feel so much like

a free-for-all in which

everyone can get away

with anything, as it does

a reminder that each of us sees

the world through the filter of self;

and when we pretend that we don't –

when we decide and declare

that the most important changes

needed in the world should come from

and be most costly to others –

we are completely ignoring both

our greatest challenge 
and our finest opportunity

to make the world a better place.

Transformation from within

is both possible and essential,

not because we are capable

or holy on our own, but because

we are created from and with divine breath.

Resurrection is a gift from God

that rests at the core of our being.

We can spend our time expecting

someone else to bring us joy –

to rescue us from loneliness and discontent –

keeping a tight lid on the spark within,

or we can practice setting self aside

and getting out of the way

so resurrection overflows.

It's an inside-out reaction

that turns grace loose and sets hope free.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Neighbor

In Dependence

Though it may feel like

a courageously climbed mountain,

independence is more

of a slippery slope.

Each of its manifestations comes

with a price; each release

attaches a sometimes-invisible tether.

Country to country,

economy to economy,

people to people;

no piper goes unpaid.

There's really only one

freedom that's free –

that doesn't entangle the universe

in a throat-grasping imbalance of desperation.

It's not the freedom

to choose what others can’t,

not the freedom

to have what others don't.

It's the freedom to be

who others can't:

the one true, connected self

of voluntary gifting and dependence

for which God created you.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Freedom

It really has no thumbnail view;

won’t be found where “me and mine”

live in homogenously gated communities;

bolts unannounced with claustrophobia

when its definition is squeezed

into the privatized closet of self.

Violence and control are temporary.

The forces of the universe can only

be held at bay for so long before

cracks in the dam of possessiveness

begin to leak the world back into balance.

Freedom resides outside the walls,

beyond the cliffs, near the beach,

where the sea of humanity steadily

and gently laps against earth’s shore.

That’s where the hungry are fed,

the naked clothed, the sick healed,

and the dead laid to rest in peace.

It knows no borders, fears no differences,

sleeps with neither medicine nor anxiety;

is possessed by God and possesses not.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins