To Feel the Presence

Meaning in Psalm 42

Alfred D. Byrd

GETTING away from my God, I find
Within me a hunger to feel the Presence—
Holiness taking the place of doubt—
Of the One Who lives and gave me my life.
I'm thirsty for water of life that yields
Renewal of hope and strength for labor
Bringing about God's will on the earth.
I desire to meet again with my God
And show my love for the One Who loves me—
Fallen, I rise when I see the Throne.

I used to be both faithful and first
In seeking the will of God in prayer,
Reading the Word that came from the Throne,
Attending with others the service of praise,
Proclaiming the gift of life to the world,
And meeting the needs of neighbors who suffer.
Somehow, however, I've gotten away
From doing the works that please my God.
Like Esau, I've traded my birthright for beans
That fill my belly no more than a day,
But leave me empty — hungry and lost.

The world around me is mocking my God
And me for trusting a Source unseen.
"A savior? You're senseless. We live awhile
And fade to nothing. Have fun while you can!
We need no God to explain creation.
Random ripples in what could become
Gave rise to space and time where we formed
By laws requiring no mind to write them.
Purpose, one must decide for oneself.
Our minds are the best of which we know;
We must choose our own path from birth to grave.
You're wasting your time in trusting a ghost
To do what you need to do for yourself.
Just eat and drink; tomorrow, you'll die."

The world of the minds that spurn their Maker
Suffers daily from pride and from rage,
The feelings of those who've gathered riches
Making them masters of those with none,
And of those oppressed by holders of wealth.
A conflict goes on without an end —
A ferment of lives whose meaning is lost
Because they've denied existence beyond them.

Skeptics have gotten creation backwards.
Heaven never accounts to the earth.
Our God doesn't need to explain to us
A reason to be — a reason to do—
As if God needed permission to live
From those whose life has come from the Throne.
The One Who was, and is, and will be
Required no help from pundit or sage
To exist, or to make all else exist.
The One has chosen to make a world
As a home for creatures whose goal is to seek
The light and the love of the One Who shaped them.
Only the one who believes in the One
Will live with purpose lasting and true.

It's easy to drown in a world gone mad.
The waves of conflict are breaking upon us—
Hurtled through rapids, we strike the rocks
Of scorn from the world. A boat built on trust
In things of this life will sink at once
And leave no sign of where it foundered.
Only the one who holds out a hand
To the One Who walked on water will feel
A grip of rescue — a hug of welcome—
Meaning for life delivered from death.

If this poem spoke to you, you may enjoy my Biblical epic poems

A Song of the One, the age-old account of Creatlon, Fall, Redemption, and Glory retold in verse for a new millennium, and

The Stars Bow Down: An Epic of Joseph, the timeless tale of a favorite son whose brothers sold him into slavery, but whom God raised from a prison to save the known world from famine.

To Those Made Helpless

Meaning in Psalm 41

Alfred D. Byrd

HAPPINESS flowers in one who loves
A neighbor as much as one loves oneself.
The one who pleases our God the most
Is the one who attends to the need of others.
Giving one's time, one's wealth, and one's love
To those made helpless by pain and by grief
Is being like God, Who saw our fall
And chose, at the cost of shame and of death,
To make us a way to hope and to joy.
The one who helps the fallen rise up
Will be raised by God in a day of trouble.

Nothing, however, is easy in life.
In a world condemned by sin to darkness,
Even the righteous may suffer, may die,
For reasons ungrasped in the here and now.
Like Job, the righteous who suffer may hear
The voice of friends condemning the sick
For sins imagined that caused their pain.
Too often, we must confess to our shame,
We see in part, but we judge the whole
As if we were God, Who sees all things—
Both start and finish — with sight undimmed.
Let us have the wisdom to see ourselves
As lacking the right to judge our neighbors.
Silence is better than making a guess
When we know too little to say what's true.

The worst of griefs that we face in life
May well be hatred received from neighbors.
Enemies hurt us by telling falsehoods;
Gossip spreads them like sparks on the wind.
What starts in anger may spread like wildfire,
Burning whatever may lie in its path.
Where we saw a field of flowers at dawn,
We may see no more than ashes at dusk.
How swiftly a lie can destroy a life!
How swiftly a friend who listens to lies
Can become instead the worst of foes.

False witness may be as bad as murder;
Gossip is often a tool of death.
To speak a lie that sullies a life
Will rob a victim of joy and of hope
As much as maiming or killing would do.
Repeating rumors as proof of guilt
Is just as bad as starting a lie.
To murder a name is to take a life.
Our God requires believers to be
Upholders of truth for friend and for foe.
When we stray from the truth, we may be the cause
Of breaking the bonds between friend and friend.

AMONG the griefs that we face in this world,
The worst may well be to lose a friend.
Our God understands this worst of griefs.
The Son, becoming human to save us,
Gathered around Him a circle of friends
Whom He taught the truth, and with whom He shared
The bread of peace in joy and in grief.
A man who had known the bread and the truth
Grew filled with envy, and spurning the Son,
Betrayed Him to foes who had sought His life.
Among the griefs that He took to His death
Was grief for a friend whom He'd lost forever.

Here is the hope for which we've waited:
Dying wasn't the end for the Son.
He rose to open a way to life
For all who will call on His name in faith.
We have no god who's deaf to our cries
And blind to the sin that mars this world.
Our God understands our pain and our grief;
Our God has felt them within the Son.
Our God is with us on paths through darkness;
Heartbreak is eased when shared with our Friend.
At the end of our shame there lies our glory,
Sharing with God the bliss of His home.

Our hope is not for heaven alone,
But should spur our hearts to love this life
And our hands to try to heal its hurts.
Until the day when we live in light,
We can bring a piece of heaven to earth
By showing the love of God in our lives—
The love that is left when we lose all hope
But our hope in the One Who has shared our pain.

If this poem spoke to you, you may enjoy my Biblical epic poems

A Song of the One, the age-old account of Creatlon, Fall, Redemption, and Glory retold in verse for a new millennium, and

The Stars Bow Down: An Epic of Joseph, the timeless tale of a favorite son whose brothers sold him into slavery, but whom God raised from a prison to save the known world from famine.

Humble and Pure

Meaning in Psalm 40

Alfred D. Byrd

MANY of us are pleased with ourselves
Because of good that we've done in this world.
We give till it hurts; we shun false pleasures—
Certainly, persons as fine as we are
Manifest blessings of God on high.
We can point at Scripture and say, "Right here
Is the law I've kept. I deserve some honor."
Isn't our doing what's good in our sight
Enough to make us children of God?

We learn with shock when we read the Word,
"Your God rejects the work of your hands
Unless your heart is humble and pure.
You may give the blood of beasts to Me,
And say, 'I've fulfilled the law of my God,'
But lose the rewards of what you've done
Because your surface is false to your heart:
Your lips may say 'Love'; your heart says 'Hate.'"
(Can I say, "My cup is clean outside,"
But deny corruption that stains me within?)
When we do a thing commanded by God,
But do it with evil defiling our heart,
Our act displeases the One Who made us:
Motive, not means, is the test of faith.

The one whose service pleases our God
Is the one who says, "Not my will, but Yours."
Our food and our drink should be to do
Whatever our God has chosen for us.
Our model in life should be our Savior.
Leaving a home of glory, of praise,
He came to the earth to do the will
Of the One Who sent Him to die in our place.
Amid a world that opposed His work—
A world that saw itself as righteous,
Turning its gaze from shame at its heart—
He proclaimed the truth most precious to God:
"Whatever you do will come to nothing,
Empty of fruit enriching your life,
Unless you die to yourself and live
In the light, in the love, of God, your Maker.
Heaven belongs to the ones reborn.
The one who offers one's life to God
Produces new life that has no end."
What He spoke with His lips, He showed by His death.
Of Him, the blood of beasts was a sign:
His blood would purge forever of sin
The life of all who'd trust in His name.
The world took His life; our God gave it back
And raised Him to sit beside the Throne
And win us mercy whenever we fall.

The world in which we live is evil.
Loving the world too much will gain us
Only the heartbreak of love betrayed.
The one who embraces the world will feel
The anguish of thorns that pierce one's flesh.
How happy we are because, when we hurt,
We can turn to God and find the Savior
Granting forgiveness to those who weep,
And giving new purpose to lives once wasted!
Singing replaces murmurs and moans
In all who accept the gift of love
From One Who died submissive to God
And lives to lead the lost to the light.
Let us live for God and do the will
Of the One Whose death restored our hope!

If this poem spoke to you, you may enjoy my Biblical epic poems

A Song of the One, the age-old account of Creatlon, Fall, Redemption, and Glory retold in verse for a new millennium, and

The Stars Bow Down: An Epic of Joseph, the timeless tale of a favorite son whose brothers sold him into slavery, but whom God raised from a prison to save the known world from famine.