You tell people living in shanties Jesus is going to fix it up all right with them by giving them mansions in the skies after they're dead and the worms have eaten 'em. You tell $6 a week department store girls all they need is Jesus; you take a steel trust wop, dead without having lived, gray and shrunken at forty years of age, and you tell him to look at Jesus on the cross and he'll be all right. You tell poor people they don't need any more money on pay day and even if it's fierce to be out of a job, Jesus'll fix that up all right, all right-all they gotta do is take Jesus the way you say. I'm telling you Jesus wouldn't stand for the stuff you're handing out. Jesus played it different. The bankers and lawyers of Jerusalem got their sluggers and murderers to go after Jesus just because Jesus wouldn't play their game. He didn't sit in with the big thieves. I don't want a lot of gab from a bunkshooter in my religion. I won't take my religion from any man who never works except with his mouth and never cherishes any memory except the face of the woman on the American silver dollar. I ask you to come through and show me where you're pouring out the blood of your life. I've been to this suburb of Jerusalem they call Golgotha, where they nailed Him, and I know if the story is straight it was real blood ran from His Hands and the nail-holes, and it was real blood spurted in red drops where the spear of the Roman soldier rammed in between the ribs of this Jesus of Nazareth. THE REDEEMER SIEGFRIED SASSOON DARKNESS: the rain sluiced down; the mire was deep; When peaceful folk in beds lay snug asleep; There, with much work to do before the light, We lugged our clay-sucked boots as best we might I turned in the black ditch, loathing the storm; No thorny crown, only a woolen cap He wore an English soldier, white and strong, He faced me, reeling in his weariness, THE GREAT MAN EUNICE TIETJENS I cannot always feel His greatness, Sometimes He walks beside me, step by step. And paces slowly in the ways— The simple, wingless ways. That my thoughts tread. He gossips with me then, Not as an eagle might, His great wings folded, be content, To walk a little, knowing is His choice, But as a simple man, And I forget. Then suddenly a call floats down From the clear airy spaces, The great keen, lonely heights of being. And He who was my comrade hears the call And rises from my side, and soars, Deep-chanting, to the heights. Then I remember. And my upward gaze goes with him, and I see Far off against the sky The glint of golden sunlight on His wings. A LOST WORD OF JESUS HENRY VAN DYKE Hear the word that Jesus spake Where the crimson lilies blow Round the blue Tiberian lake: Through the fields of harvest walking Of the secret thoughts that feed Weary hearts in time of need. Art thou hungry? Come and take; 'Tis the sacrament of labor; meat and drink divinely blest, Friendship's food, and sweet refreshment; strength and courage, joy and rest. Yet this word the Master said, Silent and forgotten lay Buried with the silent dead,- There the word the Master said Written on a frail papyrus, scorched by fire, wrinkled, torn, Hidden in God's hand, was waiting for its resurrection morn. Hear the Master's risen word! Delving spades have set it free,- Rise, and let thy voice be heard, Like a fountain disinterred. Upward-springing, singing, sparkling; Till the clouds of pain and rage Brooding, o'er the toiling age, As with rifts of light are stirred By the music of the word; Gospel for the heavy-laden, answer to the labourer's cry; "Raise the stone and thou shalt find me; cleave the wood, and there am I." C. REVEALED IN THE GUIDANCE OF INDIVIDUAL LIVES A GOOD BISHOP ANONYMOUS, 10th Century A.D. (Old High German) Translated by Wm. Taylor Before St. Anno Six were sainted Of our holy bishops. Like the seven stars They shall shine from heaven. Purer and brighter Is the light of Anno Than a hyacinth set in a gold ring! This daring man We will have for a pattern; And those that would grow In virtue and trustiness Shall dress by him as at a mirror. As the sun in the air So went Bishop Anno Between God and man. Such was his virtue in the palace That the emperor obeyed him; He behaved with honour to both sides And was counted among the first barons. In his gestures at worship He was awful as an angel Many a man knew his goodness. Hear what were his manners |