Aspiring Poet, heartfelt thoughts.I have Just Discovered that I can write

The Thief We Welcome "So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom."   Psalm 90:12  Some thoughts are born from hours of study. Others are born in the middle of an ordinary moment when God causes you to see something you have overlooked your entire life. That is how this thought came to me. Tonight, I was talking with my daughter. It was just a normal conversation, one of those moments we often take for granted. But somewhere in the middle of that conversation, a thought entered my mind that I could not shake: Time is the only thief everyone welcomes. The more I thought about it, the more unsettling it became. Because it is true. We spend our lives protecting the things we own. We lock our doors. We guard our possessions. We insure our homes. We protect our treasures. But there is one thief that never has to sneak in. One thief that never has to break a window. One thief that we invite into our lives every morning. We call him Time . We hang cloc...

  "Heaven is filled with people religion missed." That was the first thought. It was not meant to be a poem. It was not even meant to be a complete sentence. It was simply a thought that settled deep in my heart. Because when I look through Scripture, I see something that should humble every one of us. The people Jesus reached were not always the people religion expected. The thief hanging beside Him on the cross was not a man anyone would have chosen. He had no time left to prove himself. No time to clean up his past. No time to rebuild his reputation. He had only a broken heart and a desperate plea. And Jesus saw him. Religion would have seen a criminal. Christ saw someone worth dying for. That thought became the first stone in the foundation of this poem. Religion Sees the Sin. Christ Sees the Soul. The next thought came from something I have wrestled with in my own life. How often do we look at people and only see what is broken? We see the addiction. We s...

  There are some thoughts that do not begin as words. They begin as a feeling. A weight. A question that refuses to leave. This poem did not begin with a desire to write about the church, sinners, or judgment. It began with a disturbing thought: Why do we fear the smell of someone else's brokenness when we have forgotten the smell of our own? Somewhere along the way, many of us have learned how to clean the outside of the grave while forgetting that we were once buried inside it. We know how to look the part. We know how to say the right things. We know when to stand, when to sit, when to bow our heads, and when to raise our hands. We can wear the clothes. We can speak the language. We can even convince ourselves that we are far away from the darkness we once walked through. But underneath all of it is a truth we do not like to remember: We were all once standing in the same grave. The first thought that came was the image of a grave. Not because I wanted to write...

  "The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit." — Psalm 34:18 There is a kind of grief that few people talk about. People expect you to miss your mom. They expect the tears. They expect the holidays to hurt. They expect you to think of her when you hear a certain song or smell a familiar recipe. What they don't expect is that you lose part of your identity. My mom didn't just love me. She understood me. She knew the parts of me that I never had to explain. She knew when I was hurting before I spoke a word. She knew when I was trying to be strong while quietly falling apart. She knew when to laugh with me, when to challenge me, and when I simply needed someone to sit beside me. Most of all... She knew where I fit. That may sound like a strange thing to say, but when someone knows you that deeply, they become an anchor. You never question whether you belong because, with them, you always did. Then one day...

  “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” — Psalm 139:23-24 Where the Thought Began Every poem begins somewhere. Sometimes it begins with joy. Sometimes it begins with inspiration. But sometimes... Sometimes it begins with a battle taking place deep within the soul. The first thought that started this poem was simple: We all have darkness inside of us. Not the darkness we easily see in others. The darkness we refuse to acknowledge in ourselves. The hidden pride. The quiet bitterness. The wounds we cover. The sins we justify. The weaknesses we pretend are not there. It is easy to look across the room and see someone else's failures. It is much harder to stand before God and ask: "Lord, what darkness is hiding within me?" That was the beginning of this poem. Not judgment. Reflection. The First Step: Realizing Every Heart Has a Battle The first...

  "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." — Ephesians 2:10 From the moment we enter this world, people begin trying to define us. They measure us. They compare us. They assign expectations to us. Without realizing it, they build invisible boxes and tell us where we belong, how we should think, how we should act, and what "normal" should look like. But what happens when God creates someone who doesn't fit inside that box? What happens when a person thinks differently, learns differently, or sees the world through a perspective others don't understand? Too often, what is unfamiliar is mistaken for what is wrong. Yet throughout Scripture, God repeatedly chose people who did not fit the world's expectations. Shepherds became kings. Fishermen became apostles. A persecutor became a preacher. God's work has never depended on human definitions of normal. When the World...

 This Grief Has a Pulse This grief has found a heartbeat, It pounds beneath my shattered chest; A slow, relentless echo That grants my weary soul no rest. My mind has learned the bitter truth— Your gentle voice has long since fled; Yet every corner of my heart Still swears you never truly left. The child within still calls your name, Though silver now has crowned my hair; He waits beside an empty door, Convinced you'll somehow meet him there. How long, O Lord, must sorrow burn? How long this weight of flesh and bone? This ache is more than tears can tell— It feels as though my soul has grown Too heavy for this frame alone. I know the grave has sealed its claim, I know these eyes won't see you here; But reason cannot quiet love, Nor silence longing year by year. There are no words to mend this wound, No hand of mine can make it cease; For every breath still whispers, "Mom..." Then breaks beneath the weight of grief. Yet through the valley, dark and d...

 In the quiet room, Where shadows clung to every wall, I held my precious Hallie toes, As her breath began to still, And in that moment, time seemed to freeze, Leaving only the echo of a heartbeat, And the unbearable weight of loss in my arms. Her spirit, so gentle and pure, took flight, Beyond the pain, beyond the tears, Into the arms of Jesus, Where my hands could no longer reach. My heart shattered, each piece Falling like silent, unspoken prayers, As heaven welcomed her home, And I felt the aching void of her absence. But even in the depths of this grief, A light remains, faint yet steady— The nine days we were blessed to have with her, A fleeting gift, but a precious one. Though those days were far too few, They were filled with love, And for that, we are forever grateful. We are thankful too, that in her brief time, She never knew the harshness of this world, That she was spared from pain, And found her rest in the arms of her Maker, A peace we cling to in our sorrow. In the ...

 In fleeting moments, life drifts by,   Whispers of time, a silent sigh.   From Heaven’s vantage, I observe,   Are you prepared, with heart and nerve? When the call comes, swift and true,   What will you hear? What will you do?   In the stillness of the night,   Do you ponder what is right? Each heartbeat a precious gift,   A chance to mend, to heal, to lift.   What have you done with the Light I gave?   Will you stand firm, or will you cave? In your soul’s quiet quest,   Have you lived with grace, with zest?   Have you repented of your sins,   Or just found fault in others’ whims? I am the Truth, I am Jesus,   Whom thou crucified—might you be wrong?   Are you too proud to be reproved,   Or do you embrace the cutting asunder? In humility, have you embraced   The love and truth I’ve traced?   As you traverse this ea...