Surely Risen (Part Two) | An original poem by Briana Augustus
To have a layover means you are on a journey.
You have a destination defined,
Just not quite able to arrive in one grand stride.
The midpoints are often where we first feel we’ve hit a wall
So we must pace ourselves,
For our track is unknown -
Rocky, slippery, plush or smooth.
Keep your feet shod in the gospel of peace.
Jesus reached out with shalom aleichem
to bring peace unto us first,
To release our burdens, let us become immersed.
The garden at Golgotha is where Jesus was laid
He told us “I have called you friends..”
And “Greater love, Has no one than this:
Than “to lay down one’s life for one’s friends”
So Jesus made a special visit
To this world - His destination
In order to see Man - His imitation
And hand-deliver His personal invitation -
Nail-scarred, for the believability of nations
But don’t forget now - faith:
It is confidence in what we hope for,
Assurance of what we do not see.
Peter entered the tomb of Jesus that day
To see the strips of linen from His body -
Then the burial cloth from around His head,
Separate and folded up on the side
The other disciple there, then hesitantly walked in
To find no Jesus but the Christ had tidied His tomb.
A good house guest makes it a point
to leave things nicer than when they came -
Showing gratitude for the host’s hospitality.
You fold the blankets and make up the bed
before you head out, but Jesus didn’t just check out
This was no hotel: a stranger’s place to leave
and have someone come clean up behind you
No one was coming after Jesus to clean up any other mess.
He cleaned it all - so we might have rest.
He left his home to clean up ours -
To leave us better off than we were when He came.
With all the things witnessed in those days,
They still missed the understanding.
Jesus HAD to rise from the dead.
Even the unbelieving factions believed Jesus enough
to fear His promise of resurrection -
But His death could not console them,
They could not rest in their expected satisfaction
But WHY - why fear the King of Jews
if he amounts to nothing more than a mockery?
Well, that’s the power of the Divinity housed within Christ’s mortality
He pronounced their malady before their faces -
But blind eyes can’t read lips.
So as He did then, here He appears now - proclaiming,
“For all have surely sinned, and fallen short
of the glory of God”
So confess your sins to the Father, and let go of the chains,
Love has already broken the restraints
So loosen your tightened fists and fingers,
And join the heavenly host of singers
For the LORD has arisen!
He’s rolled away the stone and unlocked your prisons,
So walk through and to the Father
For Jesus Christ has surely risen!
References: Hebrews 11:1; John 15:13; The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; GOD