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God Is Not a Church

Is God a church of forgotten people?
Is God a loveless creed?
Does God reach down to the masses
and love them in their need?
People forget how to be people,
singing familiar, unfamiliar songs;
hiding their fears and guilt
behind their unconfessed wrongs.
They have worked so hard surviving at their
boring, dead-end jobs
they can't focus anymore
on the strength and power of God.
But they're on the way to somewhere.
A minister can tell.
He looks up, smiling at them.
His life is going well.
He's saved for his vacations
and he's saved for a new car.
He has money in the bank.
His stocks are going far.
And the poor stay in their corner
and the rich stay at the front;
and the poor don't know their Bible;
so they're standing in a rut;
and Fate is a busy person
who wanders through the halls;
laughing at the deceased ministers
who never thought at all.
Life gets busy in the city.
Everyone forgets your name.
No one understands forgiveness.
But they're dying just the same.
And Time destroys tradition;
leaving nothing there at all;
And Death seals every coffin
'til they're all lost in a wall.
But God's deeper than tradition;
He moves swift like flames of wind.
Only those who choose to love God
recognize Him as their friend.
Will we be reborn tomorrow
and forget what we have been;
even though our pain and sorrow
tells us life should have an end?
There's a beauty in creation,
in the pounding of the sea.
Does the suffering really matter
when the sufferer is set free?

Janet Marie Bingham

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