The Human Condition

Irreversibility and the Power to Forgive

The discoverer of the role of forgiveness in the realm of human affairs was Jesus of Nazareth. The fact that he made this discovery in a religious language is no reason to take it any less seriously in a strictly secular sense.

p. 190, Wise Women, edited by Susan Cahill

So much of what we need to do to free our hearts and souls is simply to acknowledge the truth. The rest will happen naturally.
Love has no price. It’s only love if it is free.
Journey to the Heart, p. 82, Melody Beattie

Denver Yoder – Somerset, OH
A proper connection, beside the still waters

Above all else, guard your heart,
For everything you do flows from it.

Keep your mouth free of perversity;
Keep corrupt talk far from your lips.

Let your eyes look straight ahead;
Fix your gaze directly before you.

Give careful thought to the paths for your feet and be steadfast in all your ways.
Do not turn to the right or the left;
Keep your feet from evil.

While it’s fun to go on a trip, and trips often coincide with going places in our personal lives, we don’t have to load up the car and hit the road to find what we’re looking for.

The places of power that we seek are within us.

… But the places, the locations we visit, are only mirrors, extensions of ourselves.

p. 64, Journey to the Heart, Melody Beattie

Our god is always searching for
Strong men to bridge the gap;
Whose sons are reaching manhood, and
Outgrown their mommy’s lap.

yes, god is looking still for men
Whose homes are bathed with prayer,
Young soul’s eternal destinies
Are trusted to their care.

Do they see dad rush off to work,
’provider’ his disguise?
Meanwhile those filthy dollar signs;
They dance before his eyes.

Perhaps it’s fame you’re hoping for,
Though humble you maybseem.
The devil does not care a bit
Into which ditch you lean.

our churches need strong families,
That stand against the tide;
When wordly waves of fashion rise
To threaten all inside.

Rise up, you men, and meet the need,
Lay earthly cares aside.
your child observes what matters most,
Your heart you cannot hide.

when on the last great judgement day, before the throne of god,
Will they have witnessed sincere love,
Or pious church facade?

the sunset comes, your works all done.
What would you leave down here?
A legacy of pomp and wealth,
Or path marked straight and clear?

Lois Troyer
Beside the Still Waters, Volume 27, Issue 1

Our children are the tend’rest gift
God places in our hands.
Be fruitful and go multiply,
His earliest command.
Still other homes may heed the call,
When orphan children cry,
Will you love us and point us to
A savior up on high?

Though Hannah had a barren womb,
And she could not conceive;
Daily crying in faith to god,
He granted her her plea.
When Samuel was a little lad,
She gave him to the lord
To serve god in a priestly role;
This her divine reward.

Mothers will you teach your children,
By showing them the way?
Are you reading god’s word often
And teaching them to pray?
The world has snares we fail to see,
They threaten to destroy.
Will you, dear mother, faithful be,
God’s spirit to employ?

Mother’s hold the hands of children
For but a little while.
Will they hear, ”well done, my servant,”
and see the father’s smile?
The moment that new life begins,
Ethernity’s in view,
Use each precious golden moment,
To show them christ in you.

Lois Troger
Beside the Still Waters, Volume 27, Issue 1

The prophetic and practical wisdom of women – that the gift of life comes with the responsibility to love and protect it wherever we find it, regardless of particular identifications within borders of race, religion, gender and class – has never waned.
Vision and conscience are its continuing signs; hope and anger its dissonant emotional tones. The anger is induced by the vast evidence of the waste of the lives of many and the feast of life reserved for the privileged few.

Page 160, wise women: over 2000 years of spiritual writing by women. edited by susan cahill, 1996

I look for the lord

Our wealth has wasted all away,
Our pleasures have found wings;
The night is long until the day;
Lord, give us better things –
A ray of light in thirsty night
And secret water-springs.

Our love is dead, or sleeps, or else
Is hidden from our eyes:
Our silent love, while no man tells
Or if it lives or dies.
Oh give us love, O lord, above
In changeless paradise.

Our house is left us desolate,
Even as thy word hath said.
Before our face the way is great;
Around us are the dead.
Oh guide us, save us from the grave,
As though thy saints hast led.

Lead us where pleasures evermore
And wealth indeed are placed,
And home on an eternal shore,
And love that cannot waste;
Where joy thou art unto the heart,
And sweetness to the taste.

p. 152, the 19th century, wise women, edited by susan cahill

790

Nature – the gentlest mother is,
Impatient of no child –
the feeblest – or the waywardest –
Her admonition mild –

In forest – and the hill –
By traveller – be heard –
Restraining rampant squirrel –
Or too impetuous bird –

How fair her conversation –
A summer afternoon –
Her household – her assembly
And when the sun go down –

Her voice among the aisles
Incite the timid prayer
Of the minutest cricket –
The most unworthy flower –

when all the children sleep –
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light her lamps
Then bending from the sky –

with infinite affection –
And infinite care –
Her golden finger on her lip –
Wills silence – everywhere –

circa 1863
The 19th century, wise women, susan cahill editor