“Kind Words,” for the people of FMSC

This is what I wrote
and what I need to say.

The blank page seems to
stare at me and dare me
to put the pen down
and the blank faces
make me want to walk away,
but this is what I felt
and what stirred inside of me:
that a landscape wasn’t
what I made of it,
but that I could be a part of it,
that a sunrise was not
glorious by my
declaration or explanation,
but by my exclamation,

and this is what I wrote,
what I need to say,
what you should read
and receive, hear and
take.  And I give you
what you deserve, no less,
and it would be wrong of me
to leave these pages blank
or simply turn away, failing
to notice the spirit in your faces,
the stories in your eyes,
the ministry that humbles me,
so this is what I wrote,
and what I need to say:

that the strength of community
is not in its complexity
or composition, complexion
or composure, but in its
unity, coming together as one,
and that the needs of society
are what each one of us
needs to survive.  When I was
hungry, you fed me.  You,
society, are more than blank faces,
you have color in your cheeks
and muscles at the corners of
your mouths, and words to move me,
and this is what I wrote, what I need to say.

"Your ministry," I wrote,
"inspires me, and
thank you," I need to say,
"for letting me be a part of it."
Which is all that I was,
and all that one might ever write
or say, but all, I want to add,
that a ministry should ever be,
inviting me of all nations
to be made a disciple,
showing me what it takes
to feed my world.  Amen?
Anyway, this is what I heard
and what I need to pray.

Community.  Come.  Unity.
Society.  Our common needs.
And Ministry.  Inviting me.
Amen and amen:
Kind words were what they
asked of me, and I
did not make these words up,
they were given me
like a landscape or a
sunrise, stirring
and glorious and
calling for exclamation!
So be it, truly, truly, this
is most certainly true,

And that is what I wrote
and what I need to say.