I was driving and I saw the clouds were dark and coming into the area.
I heard a voice saying, “A storm is brewing”. I was doing some
research and ran across this description of Christ:
What has this Jesus to do with the mild Galilean peasant of
Renan's fancy? Here is a man of more than Napoleonic stature,
who spreads around him astonishment and dismay; whose words
are perplexing in the extreme; who goes on puzzling his disciples
to the very end; who flaunts the conventional piety of his day; and
yet who all through remains human, without a single trait
characteristic of the Greek hero, the theios aner. Here are problems
galore, if at anytime we would venture to write a life of Jesus and
we may be certain that what we write will be wholly unacceptable
to those who like their Jesus tamed and conventionalized and are
not willing to be led away to the bleak uplands on which he moves
in the Gospel according to St. Mark.
I then saw this poem which was referenced in an article about the portrayal of Christ in the Gospel of Mark.
Do not retreat into your private world,
That place of safety, sheltered from the storm,
Where you may tend your garden, seek your soul,
And rest with loved ones where the fire burns warm.
To tend a garden is a precious thing,
But dearer still the one where all may roam,
The weeds of poison, poverty and war,
Demand your care, who call the earth your home.
To seek your soul it is a precious thing,
But you will never find it on your own,
Only among the clamor, threat and pain,
Of other people's need will love be known.
To rest with loved ones is a precious thing,
But peace of mind exacts a higher cost,
Your children will not rest and play in quiet,
While they hear the crying of the lost.
Do not retreat into your private world,
There are more ways than firesides to keep warm,
There is no shelter from the rage of life,
So meet its eye, and dance within the storm.
In the power and peace of Christ, may we meet the eye and dance within the storm.
::stephen