9-14-15 A House Not Made With Hands

For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

2 Corinthians 5:1 KJV

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The end of life is not the end of life

For those whose faith is in the Son of God.

This earthly body’s filled with pain and strife

To crumble one day like a poor facade.

But we will not despair when that day comes;

You’ll see us smile upon our final breath.

The moment we’re evicted from the slums

We move into a mansion void of death.

In this eternal home not made with hands,

We’ll tarry in the presence of the Lord.

The family of the Spirit understands

This glorious domain’s our first reward.

Don’t grieve when we escape this earthen shell.

Our new estate’s in heaven – there we dwell.

4-15-15 Abstain

Once newly into Christ you don’t belong,

For Christ is into you: Home isn’t here,

And where you go the light will shine so strong

A pilgrim’s path shall form to drive sin clear.

Abstain from fleshy lusts, which fight the soul,

For they can drive a wedge ‘tween God and you;

They turn your vision from its Holy goal

And cause a stumbled fall to tarry, too.

The worldly world of lust is sensual,

Tempts sight and touch and sound and taste and smell.

It bids you come and join the festival,

Then pins you to the wall of death and hell.

Abstain from lust, my sister newly saved

You have a choice: be free or be enslaved.

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Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims,

abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;

1 Peter 2:11 KJV

6-10-14 Tarry

When You return with shout of acclamation

to gather up Your own

before the inevitable storm

so many will remain

their eyes wild with searching

their hearts crying out

“I should have believed!”

Beloved, please leave me here.

Let me linger among the lost

as a bellwether of hope

a pale moon circling the land

in darkness

reflecting Your light.

Let me show them how You suffered

how You interceded

how You love.

Use me as a scrub brush

to scour burnt remnants

from the bottom of the pan.

Those who break free

will make it worth this tarrying.

They will already be gathered

in Your house

like late passengers to the station

even as the final echoes

of joyful praise

whisper in their hungry ears.

Strike me as a match

that this brief flame

the faint scent of sulphur

might bring a precious few

to the altar of complete surrender.

Keep me here, Lord

among the devastation

as long as You need.

Whatever it takes.

Whatever it takes.

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“For at that time there will be great tribulation,

the kind that hasn’t taken place from the beginning of the world

until now and never will again!”

Matthew 24:21 (HCS)

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