The Trackless Path

I am nothing.

And I never thought 

It would sound so sweet.

Nothing now but to lay it down,

Nothing now but to lay it down.

How many times can a man die?

A few, it seems.  And the master wields the knife,

The master wields the knife.

How many times can this man die?

Again it seems.  Again it seems.

And the master wields the knife,

Not long now.  Oh, not long now.

But the master wields the knife.

I lay it down.  And it matters not

Because the master wields the knife.

I never thought it could sound so sweet

But with empty hands and naked feet

I approach on hallowed ground

And bear my tender flesh

For the end, it seems,

Is coming ‘round.

And I never thought

That it could be this way, but it is.

I have always had a hard time sticking to things.

And yet I have published here 

Over 200 days straight.

Grateful.

And I am holding my feet to the fire

When it comes to the story I am working on:

One project - one thing at a time.

And the goal is to finish by the end of the quarter:

One more month.

And I keep at it day after day.

Yet I am tempted to work on other things.

But I must finish one thing before I start another.  

I think that is the key.

I lay down my life.

But what does that mean?

I don’t know.  Or perhaps I do.

That I let go of all that I had hoped…again…

Which is all that He has promised,

At least my hope of receiving it in this world.

And in that, He says, there is hope

That it will surely come 

When I am gone.

What a surprise?

And I feel it in my chest.

The promise that I haven’t long.

And so I baby this old frame.  I treat it gently

With the hope that I can get it all down before I go.

Work, work, work.  

Writing down the words

That are etched upon this flesh.

And I hear the sound ring out from the unseen place.

I hear the call of Him whom I serve.

“Work, work,” he says,

“Waste out what’s left of your life

And let me be the thing that you desire.”

Put the knife away, I say.

Put the knife away.

Go back home 

And humbly pray

For faith to win the day.

There is no battle left to win

No struggle yet untried

Except the battle in man’s heart

To grapple with the lie,

The lie that we inherited

From fathers brave and true,

Fathers who believed that they

Could make the choice for you,

Who hoped that if they gave their lives

That they could make us free.

But don’t you see, nobody’s free,

Not in the way you think.

Because it doesn’t come that way.

And yet, there's One, 

A hallowed Son 

The Man of Liberty.

He did not fight to save his life

Yet set the captives free.

And we must fight

To be like Him.

To turn the other cheek.

We must fight to own the right

To walk among the meek.

Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.  Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven…  Matthew 5: 38-45

For those who beat their swords into plowshares,

There is no need for Christ to appear in the sky.

He has already appeared within their heart.

Their thousand years of peace

Have already begun.

I have found that most of the time 

People don’t know what they are angry about.

For that reason, it is better not to be angry.

It is better to choose peace.

Anger leads to war

And destruction.

And there are few

Who do not choose war

When the fires of rhetoric are kindled 

And billowed by the machine.

And anyone who has harbored anger is at risk

No matter how righteous their cause appears.

You don’t even know yourself until then.

But if you could see ahead

To what you might become,

You might forsake your anger before it’s too late.

I don’t know what to write about today.

Perhaps I could write about the mountains.

There is no good or bad there, just beauty.

And that, it seems, is good.

Perhaps that is why people have written about nature.

In nature, there is a rest for the human mind.

It is a place where we can forget 

About our endless pursuit of goodness

And about our inability to find it.

In nature, in beauty, there is mercy

If you can calm the mind enough to find it.

And that’s the best I have to offer today

An escape into the mountains,

A romp amidst their mercy.

An escape from endless thinking.

God bless you all.

When it comes to diet I am not a purist.

But there is still a part of me 

That believes that I should be,

That I should remain unspotted 

From all that defiles the belly.

And to be honest,

I really wonder if that part of me is right.

I wonder if I would be healthier if I could eat “right” 100% of the time.

But it can also be confusing.

For one thing, I haven’t always had the means to eat just right.

I haven’t always had a choice.

And those times are actually easier.

You eat what God places in front of you 

And trust that He will preserve your life

If He intends it to be preserved.

It is much harder when you have the means to make a choice.

Then you have to do your best to be “good”.

But as in all things, there is a balance.

And too much “good”, I’ve found,

Isn’t good for me.

I’ve found that there is an untamed part within

That, if I try to eat too pure,

Will sabotage my efforts.

And so, I do my best.

I strive toward the goal of health.

But I also let myself partake in things, 

Now and then, purely for the sake of comfort.

And I shun the shame that would well up and say it’s not alright.

And this seems to keep the animal part of me at bay.

It keeps the hungry monster from lashing out and taking over.

And so strangely, I eat better by not trying to be perfect.

I believe that I have found the pavilion that covereth His hiding place.

Or at least, I have found a few of the principles that define that place.  

Not surprisingly, it lies on the outskirts of the culture.

Surprisingly, it moves and you must move with it.

But it is real. I have felt the shade of its sheltering canopy.

And I have also felt that shade move in an instant

And known that it was time to move on.

Scripture is the Word of God.

And God speaks to those that listen.

Few listen, but those who do 

Have heard no less than scripture.

They have heard the very Word of God.

And that Word is no less binding upon them

Than what we have canonized as scripture,

Perhaps more binding, for it is God’s very word to them.

It is personal.  And it is incumbent upon them to heed and to obey.

And if they obey God’s Word to them,

If they treasure their personal scripture

More than all the world, 

Then God will speak again,

And again, and again, and again.

And His Word will spring up inside them,

A spring of living water welling up to eternal life.

But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.  John 4:14