Wednesday, November 7
Oh, those signs…
My friend Kevin and I meet Friday mornings from 6:30 to 8:00. It’s a great time each week. We talk about a variety of things. This last week the conversation turned to church signs (a conversation we’ve all had at one time or another).Kevin also writes poetry every now and then. (I’ve posted some of his pieces before)
After last week’s discussion over a whole grain bagel, he sent me his latest.
I asked his permission to share it with you...
I thought it appropriate to add some visuals…
First the signs:
Now the poem:
reboot
I am thoroughly appalled
by the cold, apathetic
touchpoint marketing
of my family members,
the message of conditional love
in smug, trite bold sanserif
screaming from signs
at every turn
suburban and podunk
why post a sign
if the doors are locked?
there’s far too much world
too much to take in
if the minds inside are closed
the ears clamped shut
the eyes permanently dilated
the Word stripped
of every phrase of mercy
of every active loving verb
of any shred
of good news
Sundays
or any days
are not about numbers—
we constantly remind ourselves—
but about hearts
neither will we attract
with a gospel of shame
or a gospel of fear
or a gospel of punishment
or a gospel of penance
or a gospel conditioned
with even one tiny pebble
from the larger millstone
to which we cling
when logic fails
where theology ends
and we venture
into the great grey pangea of living
to what do we default
to make sense of our surroundings
and our troubling insides?
to judgement?
to law?
to justice?
to penalties?
to some sliding scale?
these ways are no way at all
the ghost in the machine
is the wrong sort
far too dark
the virus has infected
every cell
every sector
every drive
time to defrag
the new command
should not be new
to anyone
time to post new signs
using words
if we must
time to restore
our factory settings
default to love
and reboot
November 2007
kevin reeve
Mark Nelson at 3:09 PM 1comments
1 Comments
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at 9:47 PM
ragamuffinminister said... i think i've seen one of those signs on one of my old churches i use to visit.
no, wait, it was more like: "God will scare the hell out of you."