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Kiah Gaskin

One thing that will never be taken away



When I read the Isaiah passage for the third Sunday of Advent, I knew that this was going to be my blog to write. Isaiah says that the heartbroken and the mourners will be the ones to rebuild, restore, and renew what was once devastated.


Let me say that again. The heartbroken and the mourners will be the ones to rebuild, restore, and renew what was once devastated.


Covid has wrought much devastation this year, and has in every way unmasked all kinds of pain that has been around for even longer. A few months ago I was dealing with my own, and I wrote this poem to God:


All my emotions

out here on the floor

for You

Can you handle me?

Can you handle our world?

Can you really be Lord

over all this?


All this mess

All this pain

Who is to blame

We are sick

and poor

and hungry

and lost

and anxious

and scared

and mad

and I want to

hold it together

but I need

the stability I never had


I need a home that’s mine forever

I need a family that never leaves me

Is it too much to ask?

You found me when I didn’t have a lot

And I found you

And you protected me


Did you?

Did you protect me?

Did you preserve me?

Did you hold together

the blood and veins and love

you knit and formed

in my mother’s womb


Redemption isn’t becoming new

It’s recovering

Returning

to the Beloved children we always were

the Beloved first laugh

they will never take away


Friends, if there is anything that I hope you take with you from Isaiah and from my poem, it is that God has not forsaken you. He has not forsaken me. In all of our devastation we will wear crowns of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. We will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. This good news story of Christmas belongs to us, and it is the one thing that will never be taken away.


(Accompanying scripture= Isaiah 61, 1-4)


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