Lord, all my desire is before you, and my sighing is not hidden from you. - Psalm 38:9

And now, Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. - Psalm 39:7

My God, I know You hear my prayers to You.
You know all my desires and my fears,
My worries and my struggles through and through
Far better than I know them in my tears.
My God, I do not hide what I desire
E'en though I know that foolish it may be.
O God, cleanse my desires with holy fire
That they may holy be and pure for Thee.
I know that You alone can bring me hope
And so I wait for You to calm my care.
Your providence on high can help me cope
By bringing me to You, beyond compare.
O God, hear my desires and answer me,
And help me truly serve and honor Thee!

Head, Heart, Hands

As Plato says, our reason must be strong.
The highest part within us, intellect,
Must rule the appetite, forestalling wrong,
And work with spirit, which should be subject.
But oft in man the parts disordered are;
The spirit rules, or appetite instead.
This order of one's soul is quite bizarre,
For man should always by his head be led.
My reason often fails and leads me wrong,
Or does not lead at all, and I am left
With spirit ruling, leading me along,
Or appetite, which leaveth me bereft.
O God, make reason strong to rule in me!
Subdue the bad, let me submit to Thee!

By Your Grace Alone

A sinful man, a fallen human, I;
My foolishness, I see, has only grown,
And I can do no thing but humbly cry:
"No good in me but by Your grace alone."
Day after day I fail and fail again.
Try as I might, my filthy rags have blown
Like leaves and I am left in all my pain;
I would have died but by Your grace alone.
I try to do the things I think are right,
But in the end I wish I might have known!
I failed again, bemoaning now my plight;
I could have conquered by Your grace alone.
Now, nothing left but here before Your throne,
I bow and say, "It's by Your grace alone."

Levin

The meaning of my life is clear to me:
To live for God, and also for my soul.
And though I struggle oft to rightly see,
God guides me on my path to be made whole.
I know obedience to God is good
Though oft I fail to love my neighbors still;
I know I do not do the things I should,
But God will always me with His love fill.
This knowledge in my soul is rooted deep
Through suffering and trials, secretly.
My reason scoffs at prayer, but I keep
This love for God, and know that He loves me.
My life has now a meaning, strong and clear,
Endowed with good each moment on this sphere.

Clouds

This was inspired primarily by an amazing view I saw today driving up Brea Blvd. I've never noticed it before, but when the sky is clear, you can easily see the mountains up ahead, and there were clouds above them that made the whole picture incredibly beautiful. In general, I've begun to notice that clouds can be one of the most beautiful parts of nature.

A wispy, will'wy, windswept, flying cloud
Soars high above the earth without a care.
A covering, a canopy, a shroud
Which covers earth, and makes its shadows there.
Of pearl, white, and silver, also gray,
'Twill cast dark shadows, blackening the ground;
But sometimes through will shine the sun's bright ray,
A ray of beauty, light'ning all around.
And after rains, when skies are clear and blue,
The clouds remaining make for wond'rous views
Of blues and silvers; oh! For those who knew
How one could capture all those glorious hues!
I know of little better in this world
Than 'gainst the mountains' backdrop, clouds unfurled.

The Divine Court of Law

I think I picked another hard topic to cover in 140 syllables. :P I hope it's still decent.

The laws divine are broken, and by whom?
A lowly man, not angel, no, nor beast.
The Judge and lawmaker enters the room
His majesty ennobling e'en the least.
Now the Accuser stands and makes his case;
He says, "This man here broke your righteous laws.
He's vulgar, evil, damnable, and base.
He can't go free; he's full of sinful flaws."
But up stands now Defendant, Witness, all.
He speaks with voice like thunder, yet like dove:
"I take the blame for this man's sinful fall;
My suffering will take his place in love."
The man's acquitted, free to go his way,
But woe if he rejects that joyous day!

Orthodoxy

Today, for the first time, I attended a non-Protestant church: St. Barnabas, an Antiochian Orthodox church in Costa Mesa. It was an interesting change of pace from my usual church, and gave me some things to think about.

I mostly really liked having a liturgy. It gave set, high quality to the service which I would really like to see in combination with many of the elements I like at my current church. It was also an old liturgy with huge tradition behind it and a lot of good, biblically-grounded text. Very refreshing for me, since I like the more poetic, older language better than modernized text. The choir was very good, and I really enjoyed having simple a cappella music rather than music played by a band. The downside, however, to having a liturgy is that it has little flexibility and therefore misses the modern hymns from Protestant tradition, many of which are very good. I would like a service that had a definite liturgy, but perhaps with spaces for hymns from the last few hundred years.

I'm not really sure what to think of the homily. It was a guest speaker today, but the subject of the homily was rather strange. As far as I could tell, it was about the angels, and how the angels are always present when man is speaking to God, so man never speaks to God alone, but in addition, there's some point when man represents the cherubim. Not really sure what it was about. On the Orthodox theology as a whole, I don't know very much, but there are a few fairly major points that I don't think I agree on. Is it enough to keep me away from the Orthodox church in the future? I don't know yet. I want to look into this more thoroughly.

In other respects, the people were quite friendly. Only confirmed Orthodox are allowed to take communion, but they have a sort of fellowship bread that visitors are allowed to eat. I didn't quite feel comfortable, but the guy sitting next to me brought one back for me, which I quite appreciated even though my brother had already brought one back for me, too. This guy didn't know me at all, but he was willing to serve me.

One thing that came up fairly often was people making the sign of the cross or kissing the icon which the priest held. As far as the latter goes, I'm definitely uncomfortable with that at this point, and it's something that, even if I decided I like the Orthodox church in other ways, I would probably not do for a long time. The sign of the cross is interesting, though. Near the end of the service, I started wondering why people make the sign of the cross (it is usually done when the Trinity is mentioned, I think), and why they touch forehead, chest, and shoulders. It's entirely possible that it's just the most convenient way to make a cross on your body, but it also made me think: Head, Heart, Hands. (Shoulders instead of hands, close enough.) My brother said he thinks it may also be connected to Father, Son, Holy Spirit. I think there are very interesting and important parallels between these two trinities in connection with the sign of the cross, and I'm glad the service spurred me to think about it.

Overall, I definitely enjoyed a change from my regular church. Grace EV Free isn't a bad church by any means; there's a lot that I really like about it. However, I think the change from a usual Protestant style of church, which is all I've experienced in 19 years, was helpful for me. It opens me up to a broader spectrum of worship and church history and perhaps helps me to figure out a little bit more what I like in a service. For those who haven't been to an Orthodox service before, I would recommend going to one in order to broaden your experience and understand a little better those people who come from different religious traditions within the universal Christian church.