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Shelters of mercy, Whispers of love
Leonard Skaria
Vol 2/ No.4/July 2001

Unworthy, unworthy, unworthy, O Lord, Yet you showed me mercy,
Naked and weak I came from my mother's womb, loathed on the day I was born.
Hopes of living, I had none.
Yet your breath, it sustained me.

Beneath the yoke of bondage and sin, I labored.
When no eye pitied me, when none took notice of me,
Yours came searching for me, had compassion on me.
With wonders untold you redeemed me, From the clutches of sin and eternal slavery.
Cleansed me, nurtured me. You clothed me, majestic Lord,
Oh! the finest of raiment you withheld not from me.
You opened a way in the sea, no-you parted the waters with your own hands and walked with me,
To a land beyond the sea.
Your wings you spread over me-covered me, carried me.
But my redeemer, I seldom knew you, acknowledge you.
My hopes of inheriting that new land you had promised me,
wilted the moment my eyes wandered, and led my heart and my soul,
In search of other gods who could --I dreamed --pitch their tents with me, cover me and keep me.

"Lead me," I said. They didn't
"Feed me," I begged, they couldn't
"Comfort me," I pleaded.
Helpless, they stared. Then crumbled into the dust and the rust from which they were formed.
I had sacrificed my all to them.
Careers, I sought. Wealth, I acquired. Power, I found. But you, I forgot.
Comfort me, I pleaded.

Helpless, they stared. The moth and the rust and the thieves came. And then they were no more.

Naked and weak I lay once again.
No eye pitied me-my gods had long since deserted me.
I counted the length of my days.
It was my time to move on. But to where?
The desert sun glanced then glared at me with glee.
I drifted in and out of hope.

It was then that I felt that breath again and a whispered command to breath again, to live again.
A tear drop, and then another and then a torrent more came from my adulterous eyes, As I stained to see my Savior face.
I watched in a haze as a nail-pierced hand wiped a tear and then another.
It was the touch that can make shadows flee, and scales fall.
Genesis. A new light.

"I am hungry Lord," I muttered.
Manna, He gave.
"Water, Lord," for that was all my parched lips could muster.
"Come drink without cost," he whispered.

I stared at my Creator in disbelief.
A mighty King with scars on His face.
But joy and peace and love still danced about Him.
"My peace I give to you." He offered, as in times past.
It alighted on me with a gentle flutter.
I closed my eyes.
A rush of joy flooded the barren remnants of my unfaithful, ungrateful heart.

'Stay O Lord," I implored.
"I will," Blessed assurance.
"You are mine O Lord, you are all I'll ever need, you are my Master, my Lord and my King forever!" I shouted.
"I AM?" He smiled - He must have heard that a thousand times before!
"Yes my Lord, you and you alone," I reassured the searcher and discerner of hearts.

A soft touch on my shoulder prefaced it.
A knowing nod confirmed it.
A peace-filled pause delayed it, framed it, and held it up:
I was about to hear those words of forgiveness yet once more.
"I trust you, my child."

I wept, my Savior, He wept, "for joy," He said, for He had found me.
"come there is yet a little while to go before we get there."
"Where, my Lord?"
"LA place I have been preparing for you, all along."
But this desert heat is a little too much for me to travel in, my Lord," I grumbled.

A moment passed. Something stirred and danced across the desert floor.
Shadows of comfort graced my unworthy face.
Bleary-eyed, I looked up.
A pillar of cloud had taken His place.
Unworthy, unworthy, unworthy, O Lord, yet you showed me mercy.