Poems for Sunday, September 14th, 2025 (Holy Cross)
Numbers 21:4b-9, 1 Corinthians 1:18-24, and John 3:13-17.
Healing is Paradox After Numbers 21:4b-9. Healing is a paradox— a wild mercy. Like truth, healing isn’t interested in beauty for beauty’s sake. Healing is a paradox— the things that save us rarely seem to be salvation at first— a bitter herb, a stitched, suffering wound, a bronze serpent lifted high. Gold would've been more appealing. True healing startles us. It leaves us in breathless wonder, unsure and yet totally so. Healing is a paradox— sometimes it stings. Grace waits in unexpected places. And if we dare look, we might find Jesus lifted high in the deserts of our despair, dying for the purpose of living so that we might too. --- Holy Foolishness After 1 Corinthians 1:18-24. I wish the cross made sense. I wish I could explain it simply. That would be much easier. But the longer I look, the less it makes sense, and the more joy rises within. It’s foolish to try to be wise. Don’t search for Wisdom in those marketplaces of ideas— it won’t appear there. Christ is the power and the wisdom of God. Let that reorder your day into holy foolishness. --- Turn Everything Over After John 3:13-17. Like Nico I am confused by that rising Rabbi turning everything over. Being born again? Wind, water, Spirit? A simple, young Teacher lifted up as the snake in the wilderness of old? Jesus turns everything over. This is Love, not logic. And Love always exceeds all the edges of understanding. Which is why we must trust it with all and with everything and turn everything over.



Very, very good! “The desert of our despair”