Grace

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift. Rom. iii. 23-24.

Subdue, O Lord, the dull pretense
That any good resides
In us, lest we should mount defense
Where even conscience chides.

Your holy sight has never known
The slightest tinge of sin
Without you did repay it on
The guilty head again.

Yea, could we upright be from hence
To keep your Law’s demand,
Guilt still could claim no recompense
Of goodness from your hand.

O freest God! By no man bound
To pity exercise,
We cast our laurels to the ground
And dustward bend our eyes.

Redeeming mercy, faithful grace,
And steadfast love we need;
Naught else can help our helpless case,
And naught beside we plead.

Grace ere the worlds salvation planned,
Grace saves each thus loved soul,
And grace shall keep us till the end,
When all salvation’s whole.

Lord, may we in your service e’er
Exalt that gracious scheme,
And may we everlasting bear
Your wondrous grace as theme.

—5/14/26. To “New Britain” (“Amazing Grace”). Based on JI Packer, Knowing God, “The Grace of God.”

Meditations and Notes: April 2026

Abba, may I have a fish?

(Matt 7:7-11)

Do not be drawn in different directions about tomorrow, for tomorrow will draw itself in different directions. Sufficient for the day its own malice is.

(John 6:34, word study)

The Glorious Church

A love song. Psalm xlv. 1.

O Christ, whose glory filleth thy blood-beransomed Bride,
Whose grace her splendor willeth, who to adorn her died,
Though naught in us inhering can claim thy matchless love,
Thine election, endearing us, lifteth us above,
From whence thy favor freely all blessing to us brings,
Till we in beauty see thee, O peerless King of kings.

(John 17:22; Rev 5:9; Hos 2:19-20; Rev 21:2; Eph 5:25-27; Isa 64:5-7; Eph 1:3-5; Isa 33:17)

The dying thief entreated, “My Lord, remember me
When, ev’ry foe defeated, thou reign in victory.”
Like him, we wheeze and rattle our fellows’ souls to win,
And we labor in battle to crucify our sin,
But when humiliation of death shall close our eyes,
Thy conquering salvation is ours in Paradise.

(Luke 23:42; 1 Cor 15:25; Luke 23:40-41; Col 3:5; 1 Cor 15:53-54; Luke 23:43)

Elected and recorded within the book of life,
And straining till rewarded as victors in the strife,
We join the saints around us, in love and service grown,
Till thy headship hath bound us and knitted us to one:
Thy Church! from ev’ry nation and folk and tribe and tongue,
To magnify salvation around thy holy throne.

(Rev 21:27; 3:5; Eph 4:15-16; Rom 12:3-8; Rev 5:9-14)

Thy righteous scepter graces the purified above;
Thy throne is all their praises of covenantal love;
Thine exc’llent ones thou homest that they may dwell with thee,
Thou who wast, art, and comest in all eternity,
Thy sov’reign Name the only by earth and heav’n adored:
O holy, holy, holy, Almighty God, the LORD!

(Ps 45:6; 22:3; 16:3; Heb 11:14-16; Rev 21:3; 4:8; Ps 86:8-10; Rev 15:3-4; 4:8)

—4/28/26. To “Thaxted” (“O God, Beyond All Praising”). A love song.

Meditations: March 2025

If “he who began a good work in us
Will see it through to completion
At the day of Jesus Christ,”
Then what does maturation look like
Between Death and Day?
What work goes on in the night of Heaven?

(Phil 1:6; Rev 4:8; 7:15; 22:5)

Study Notes: 1 Kings 19:12-13

“And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him and said, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’” (1 Kings 19:12-13)

What follows are my notes on this passage from a reading plan I’m in. Occasionally the Lord lines up a passage I need to take to heart with a day off to dig in, and today has been one such passage and day. And digging in involves writing; I am blessed that my reading partners encourage rather than discourage this tendency. I am experimenting with preserving my longer, better notes here so I can link back to them later. Sometime I’ll have to dig through a group chat from last year and see if I can find a similar essay on Hosea 2:16-17.

Time Past and Lost

Electing Lord, my dwelling place
Thou’st been since ere the earth,
Recording in thy book my days
When yet I had no birth.

A thousand years may flurry past;
‘Tis but thy yesterday,
Short-lived as evening watches last
Or grasses on the lea.

But half my threescore I have run,
Near half again the ten,
My times are gone when just begun
And shall not be again.

Must I in ignominy stand
For all my sins of youth?
If thou wouldst guilty-verdict hand,
I must attest its truth.

No lily have I called mine own
Nor olive shoots begot;
My name is in the world unknown,
And legacy I’ve not.

Thy hand upon me heavy lies
With sorrows and with pains,
My meager life my only prize,
My weary soul complains.

But teach me, Lord, to count my days
And from their dwindling sum
To wisdom gain, that I may praise
Thee in the age to come.

For thee, Jehovah, lifted up,
I fear, e’en as I plead,
Who swearest yet unperished hope
And future guaranteed.

Have mercy on my waning years;
Let me thy goodness see.
For every one I spend in tears,
A joyful let there be.

Unto thy servants show thy ways,
Thy children, all thy pow’rs;
Bestow thy favor on our days
And bless each work of ours.

—3/28/26. Based on Psalm 90. A lament. To “Wallace” (Robb) or “St. Anne,” vaguely.

Psalm 22

I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will praise you. Psalm xxii. 22.

A song o’erflows my heart today
In echo of another,
A measure of the heav’nly lay
Began by Christ my brother.
I could not still it if I tried,
So forcefully ‘tis ringing;
His glory with I e’er abide—
How can I keep from singing?

What though I here below may seem
By God, by God forsaken,
Thy praise-ringed throne I fairer deem
Than any trinket taken.
Our fathers trusted in your love,
Their cares upon you flinging;
You rescued them, and now above
You ever keep their singing.

(1 Pet 5:7)

Though I occasion heaping scorn,
A worm despised, rejected,
Encompassed round by foes, forlorn,
Abused, and unprotected,
Yet thou hast held me since the day
I to the breast was clinging,
And still my hope on thee I stay—
I will not keep from singing!

You neither hide from nor abhor
The cause of the afflicted,
But bid me cry thy throne before
With access unrestricted,
Till with the mighty, sainted throng,
As offertory bringing,
I can the Savior’s triumph song
Lift unto thee with singing.

The furthest ends of earth shall come,
Salvation’s ballad raising,
To join the saints already home
Engaged in happy praising,
And distant generations shall
Thee know in their upbringing
And sing, “Thou hast accomplished all;
How can I keep from singing?”

—3/14/26. From Psalm 22. To “Sicilia” (“How can I keep from singing?”)

Resurrection Triumph

…he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit… Rom. viii. 11.

Hail, O resurrection morning!
When the Lord his saints recalls,
Mold’ring tents with life adorning
Till they stand, Jerus’lem’s walls;
Now they sleep, but future borning
Never fades and never falls.

(1 Thess 4:16-17; 2 Cor 5:1-2; Rev 21:2;
1 Thess 4:13-15; Isa 26:19)

If within us dwells his Spirit,
Then the death of Christ we share,
His our righteousness and merit,
His our life and peace fore’er,
And when we the earth inherit,
His the body we have there.

(Rom 6:3-4; 8:10-11)

What is dead must keep on dying
For undyingness to grow,
Till, in death’s dishonor lying,
Corpse at last in earth we sow,
Only boast left for our crying
Then, that we Jehovah know.

(1 Cor 15:50, 35-37; 1:30-31; Jer 9:24)

All thy prophets looked with longing
For thy fullness to appear,
And thy church, in patience thronging,
Waits thy second advent here,
When, with life eternal dawning,
Thou shalt dwell thy people near.

(Dan 12:1-3; Isa 26:19; Job 19:25-26;
Jam 5:7-8; Prov 4:18; Rev 20:4-6; 21:3)

Expiating our transgression,
Thou didst taste the altar’s knife
And, imputing thy perfection,
Reconciled our ev’ry strife;
Consummate O now election—
Raise our mortal flesh to life!

(2 Cor 5:21; Rom 5:10-11; 8:30, 23)

—3/10/26. To “Regent Square” (“Angels from the realms of glory”).

Meditations: February 2026

Though I inherit the wilderness,
The Lord makes streams in the desert.
He makes the desert a garden
The garden a forest.
Surely my inheritance is beautiful.

(Isa 35:6; 32:15; Ps 16:6)

The work of earth fits us for heaven.
Does the rest of heaven fit us for a glorified earth?

Fear not, O seed, to perish in the spring.

(1 Cor 15:36)

Not so many meditations this month. Part of it is that these meditations are a scratchpad (commonplace book?) for ideas that may or may not be employed in more structured poetry, and contra normal MO, I have far more than one poem cooking at the moment. Almost overwhelmingly so. So a lot of my contemplative activity is not curbed so much as delayed.

Additionally, while school and family emergency have taken much of time for creative contemplation, they have not taken my meditation. Chronicles from my daily reading is full of the steadfast love and faithfulness of the Lord, and after that finished up, Job 33:27 has much occupied my thoughts these last couple weeks: “I sinned and perverted what was right, and it was not repaid to me!” What incredible joy—Elihu says it is properly a song—to be thus forgiven by such a wonderful God.

On Sowing

Fear not, O seed, to perish in the spring;
The pretty fields will only bloom awhile;
What though the earth doth greenest, gayest smile,
Its pleasures no true joy nor lasting bring.
Awinter thou wast safe in silo kept
From trial’s frost, unto this sowing hour,
But never barn could nourish what must flow’r,
However warmly there thy kernel slept.
But when at last in soil thou art lain,
Thou shalt see beatific, summer sun
And sprouting shoot rise up in thee again
As yet more perfect life be then begun,
Until in ripened plenitude of grain
Thy resurrection-harvest’s fully done.

—2/24/26