Let's Love Large...

PAD Challenge day 24: For experienced PAD challengers, today’s final “Two for Tuesday” prompt was likely easy to guess:

1. Write a love poem.
2. Write an anti-love poem.

Let’s love large

In touch, prayer and smiles

Let’s lose all count

Of its second miles

Let’s love big

In unnumbered small ways

For love has no end

And love never fails

So, let’s choose love

Let its give-and-forgive

Reflect God

Through a love that we live

Let's let love

Be Our Charge

And through small ways

Let's love large

© Janet Martin

How many small ways can we love large today? 

Hold a door, smile, buy a Tim-card (Coffee-card)and surprise someone,

pray like we mean it, call your mother, drop by someone lonely for a visit,

add an extra I-love-you-touch to dinner... (candles or a pretty centerpiece,)

Listen when someone else is talking, 

Let's love til it becomes a way of life:)

It's as simple (or hard) as reaching beyond ourselves to cheer someone else.

Here is a humorous 'love bears all things' story from BJ.
(I printed it out for my parent's Christmas card because I know they can relate...;-)

Once Upon A World Of Woe...

Once upon a long-ago

In the quiet deep of night

Mercy found a way to woo

Hearts toward a greater Light

Once upon a manger-bed

Heaven lent to earth its Own

Hope in holy glory wed

With the dread of skin and bone

Once upon a cruel cross

The Christ-child of Bethlehem

Suffered utter grief and loss

To annul the debt of men

Once like freshly fallen snow

Sin’s atoning crimson tide

Washed across a world of woe

Leaving Heaven satisfied

© Janet Martin

For those who believe...

 First Snow unfailingly turns hearts Christmas-ward. 

Christmas unfailingly turns hearts Jesus-ward. 

Jesus unfailingly turns hearts cross-ward. 

The cross unfailingly turns hearts heavenward.

Hallelujah, 

Let the Reason for the season fill your heart with joy every day!

***

 For unto us a Child is born,
Unto us a Son is given;
And the government will be upon His shoulder.
And His name will be called
Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 

 Of the increase of His government and peace
There will be no end,
Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom,
To order it and establish it with judgment and justice
From that time forward, even forever.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.

Isa.9 6-7

Seraphim Song

The noise of nature’s naught

Is stilled; rill, hill and fell

A whisper-woven cot

Where angel-legions fell

Now every post plays host

To spectators of awe

Earth never needs to boast

But revels ‘neath God’s law

…where spectral seraphim

Rallied without a sound

Til every sprig and limb

Was grace and glory crowned

© Janet Martin

 "Come now, let us settle the matter," says the LORD. 

"Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; 

though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.

 Isa.1:18

Hath Winter Then a Heart of Tenderness

Whenever I try to cup the wonder

of first-snowfall into verse,

they echo sentiments penned a few years ago...

here is a tweaked re-run.

Hath winter then a heart of tenderness

For landscapes clad in rags of brown and gray?

Where farewell and arrival coalesce

…Winter spills forth as autumn slips away

She touches with redemption-tinted garb

The stricken aftermath of summer cheer

Her sugar-coated kisses soothe the yard

Where yesterday it suffered autumn’s tear

And where the wanton field lay naked, bare

She wreaths its frond and furrow with the gleam

Of diamonds fit to garnish angel’s hair

Tucking to earth the farmer’s finished dream

Granting a gilded respite to his care

  Spilling from sky a snowflake-choir requiem

***

Tis right to entertain both joy and grief

This season; the portent of hope and fear

Where we embark anew, the shoal, the sheaf

Of garnered days melded to bygone year

Like gathered harvest, seed then deed is wrought

Preserved beyond the elements of time

Its echoes tune the pastures of our thought

Where longing and fulfillment toll their chime

And now a gracious sheath of purity

Embellishes the dull and stricken plain

A mother with compassion’s sympathy

Blankets the grim reminders of our pain

Drawing our eyes to present mystery

History sleeps; to linger there is vain

***

Hath winter then a heart of tenderness?

White snow covers a year of scarlet tears

The barren bough reaches for her caress

The heart reaches beyond past hurt and fears

To offerings of hope and happiness

Unblemished; yet again a gift of grace

Ignores our monuments of selfishness

Where we have scathed and scarred her virgin face

With sordid sins of foolish fantasies

Time’s vault will not exhume our leaps of woe

But gently leads us from these agonies

Across a threshold unmarred as fresh snow

Granting to us but this; our memories

 To keep the good then let the remnant go  

Janet Martin~ 

Winter wanders in

wearing a white bridal gown

earth carries her veil

On Saturday night the snow came in fat pillow-y piles...

If We Could See...

Pigs are not patient creatures. When they want something they squeal, loudly! 

As the rush of Christmas season begins, let's treat each other not only with treats and sweets but with human-kindness, 'kay? 

If we could see beneath the skin

That veils the grail cradled within

If we could see we would begin

To understand and realize

How very much alike we are

For want and need, though oft they spar

Are common ground of human heart

That spills in tears, in smiles and sighs

Ah, we would not be strangers then

As we purvey the plight of men

For we are born brothers with yen

To love and to be loved

And we all want a hand to hold

Home-fires when the night is cold

Hope to cling to as we grow old

And to be understood

If we could see beyond the sigh

That slips into Time’s kindred sky

Then we would find that you and I

Are commonly designed

...and in each heart of humanness

Trembles the want for happiness

Thus we should seek with humbleness

To be patient and kind

© Janet Martin

Yesterday, at every single stop I made while running errands, it seemed to require an added amount of patience, to simply stand and wait...and wait while check-out problems were sorted out, while the cashier waited and waited for someone to help him/ her...

 The busy Christmas season approaches. Let's remember to be patient and kind 'cause NOBODY likes to be snapped at.

Live-Love-Celebrate

It was one of those hit-the-shoulder-for-a-quick-photo days... 

a heart-full-o'-wonder and glory-hallelujah praise.

We are more than mouths gaping while shaping stuttered praise

We are ageless souls clad in the flesh of numbered days

We are more than hold-let-go, yes-no and maybe-so

We are Why Christ came to die and by His grace we go

We are more than skin-bone plunder, want-wish-wonder-wait

We are God’s beloved children; live-love-celebrate

© Janet Martin

Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—John 1:12

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, Gal.3:26

For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. Rom.8:14

The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Rom.8:16