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"At a loss for words" is a common human predicament. "Words fail me." Been there? Images move, but they are so imprecise. They're mushy. Words convey truth, but consistently disappoint. Still, one has to try....
Recent Entries
God? Who Needs Him?May 31, 2013
Self-sufficient humanism. Paul saw it coming – “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.”
Imago Dei
September 12, 2012
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
Why Can't I Pray?
August 18, 2012
The bible gives us several reasons, but according to Jeremy Taylor, a deceitful heart is at the root of prayerlessness.
It's Not Rocket Science
July 23, 2012
To keep in step with the Spirit should be our daily quest. And if we are successful at that, all of life falls into place.
Theological Steak
April 10, 2012
These words by P. T. Forsythe on the magnificence of Christ's work are to theology what Ruth's Chris is to a good steak.
Describing the Indescribable
February 11, 2012
What we have in Christ will take all eternity to describe. But for one segment of one sermon, a great preacher made a mighty attempt.
Making Sense Of It All
January 30, 2012
Where are things headed? Is there rhyme and reason to the endless cycle of summer, fall, winter and spring? Is there a plan in place, or is randomness the explanation?
How Shall I Say It?
December 3, 2008
Listen to Malcolm Muggeridge, a wordsmith if ever there was one, discuss the medium of words:
The descent to words - those clumsy and inflexible bricks - is like trying to play the Missa Solemnis on a mouth-organ, or to dance the Mazurka with no legs.
A lifetime at the task but serves to make it seem the more impossible; truth in words at best attaining only meaning, beauty only elegance, and strength no more than shock.
A daddy-long-legs struggling to climb out of a bath, or a mole diligently throwing up his heap of useless earth - so the artificer of words.
Every spiritual harvest has, like Augustine's and Monica's, to be left behind, ungarnered; there is always the desolating return to the sound of words which begin and end when what they have to say has neither ending nor beginning.
Happy the dumb who cannot be mocked by what they say; the illiterates who cannot be cheated by what they read, or cheat others with what they write!
George Herbert in his DEDICATION referred to his poems as his "first-fruits, and he presented them to the Lord in his first line. In the second line he says, in effect, "actually, Lord, they came from you in the first place, they're yours already. I'm just giving them back."
He then holds up the goal of striving to use words for the Kingdom, words that "sing best thy name."
The next line is a request. Bring those people to discover my poems who "shall make a gain." In other words, who will be helped by what I write. And then, almost as an aside, he has one more request. Lord, if the reader "shall hurt themselves or me," then keep them away.
Lord, my first fruits present themselves to thee;
Yet not mine neither: for from thee they came,
And must return. Accept of them and me,
And make us strive, who shall sing best thy name.
Turn their eyes hither, who shall make a gain:
Theirs, who shall hurt themselves or me, refrain.
THE DEDICATION George Herbert
The descent to words - those clumsy and inflexible bricks - is like trying to play the Missa Solemnis on a mouth-organ, or to dance the Mazurka with no legs.
A lifetime at the task but serves to make it seem the more impossible; truth in words at best attaining only meaning, beauty only elegance, and strength no more than shock.
A daddy-long-legs struggling to climb out of a bath, or a mole diligently throwing up his heap of useless earth - so the artificer of words.
Every spiritual harvest has, like Augustine's and Monica's, to be left behind, ungarnered; there is always the desolating return to the sound of words which begin and end when what they have to say has neither ending nor beginning.
Happy the dumb who cannot be mocked by what they say; the illiterates who cannot be cheated by what they read, or cheat others with what they write!
George Herbert in his DEDICATION referred to his poems as his "first-fruits, and he presented them to the Lord in his first line. In the second line he says, in effect, "actually, Lord, they came from you in the first place, they're yours already. I'm just giving them back."
He then holds up the goal of striving to use words for the Kingdom, words that "sing best thy name."
The next line is a request. Bring those people to discover my poems who "shall make a gain." In other words, who will be helped by what I write. And then, almost as an aside, he has one more request. Lord, if the reader "shall hurt themselves or me," then keep them away.
Lord, my first fruits present themselves to thee;
Yet not mine neither: for from thee they came,
And must return. Accept of them and me,
And make us strive, who shall sing best thy name.
Turn their eyes hither, who shall make a gain:
Theirs, who shall hurt themselves or me, refrain.
THE DEDICATION George Herbert
