Your priority?

Statement – Heaven is high.

 

Question – – –

 

Is Heaven YOUR high priority?

 

– eab, 4/14/10     

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PRAYER OR POEM?

I know not how often my prayers to suspend,

To write down words poetic.

Would I be better poorly praying,

Or attempted rhymes, pathetic?

 

Hopefully, both prosaic prayer,

And feeble rhyming can God please.

One taking words from thin air,

The other placing them there, from ones knees.

 

And cannot cause a prayer to rhyme,

Even if not so grandly.

Or cause a poem to come prayer-like,

Classic or a “country dandy.”

 

Prayer and poems should the heart express,

Noon day, morning, or midnight.

And smooth or crude they should say,

The soul’s deep sorrow, or joyous delight.

                – eab, 4/2/07

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Joseph Swain – death, Apr.16, 1796

O Thou in whose presence my soul takes delight,
On whom in affliction I call,
My comfort by day, and my song in the night,
My hope, my salvation, my all.

Where dost Thou at noontide resort with Thy sheep,
To feed on the pastures of love?
Say, why in the valley of death should I weep,
Or alone in the wilderness rove?

O, why should I wander an alien from Thee,
And cry in the desert for bread?
Thy foes will rejoice when my sorrows they see,
And smile at the tears I have shed.

Ye daughters of Zion declare, have ye seen
The Star that on Israel shone?
Say, if in your tents my Belovèd has been,
And where, with His flocks, He is gone.

This is my Belovèd; His form is divine;
His vestments shed odors around:
The locks of His head are as grapes on the vine,
When autumn with plenty is crowned.

The roses of Sharon, the lilies that grow
In vales, on the banks of the streams:
On His cheeks, all the beauties of excellence glow,
And His eyes are as quivers of beams.

His voice, as the sound of the dulcimer sweet,
Is heard through the shadows of death;
The cedars of Lebanon bow at His feet,
The air is perfumed with His breath.

His lips as a fountain of righteousness flow,
That waters the garden of grace,
From which their salvation the Gentiles shall know,
And bask in the smiles of His face.

Love sits on His eye-lids, and scatters delight
Through all the bright mansions on high;
Their faces the cherubim veil in His sight,
And tremble with fullness of joy.

He looks, and ten thousands of angels rejoice,
And myriads wait for His word;
He speaks, and eternity, filled with His voice,
Re-echoes the praise of her Lord.

Dear Shepherd, I hear and will follow Thy call;
I know the sweet sound of Thy voice.
Restore and defend me, for Thou art my All,
And in Thee I will ever rejoice.

Joseph Swain died this date, 4/16/1796, at Walworth, London.  He was once apprenticed to an engraver.  After his conversion to Christ he began expressing his poetic thoughts in hymns. Then 1791 became minister of a Baptist congregation in East Street, Walworth.  He is remembered today for “O Thou in Whose Presence My Soul Takes Delight.”

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