Again, I was unable to separate the stanzas in this one, so you'll have to guess at the separation if you want to. :) This poem and the previous one are both psalms that I wrote for a class that I am currently taking.


Why Would You Care to Know My Name?

Lord I am such a small thing in a vast place.

Why would you take my shame?

Why would you care to know my name?

I made something of an offering once,

if only just to spite You.

I ate my sweet, delectable fruit,

and lifted what remained when I was through.

Its juices ran between my fingers,

while its passions ran within my veins,

and I couldn't understand Your anger,

when all I wanted was myself to claim.

My memory does not reach back to Adam;

I had no vision of a lush, green garden.

All I ever knew was separation veiled in admiration.

From birth my sick and wicked heart was hardened.

Yet despite the poisonous offering I lifted,

the one I lifted out of spite,

You deigned to pierce me with Your sword,

and as my blackened blood drained out,

You gave me Yours, and granted life.

Stars that once were simple pricks of light,

now exploded in glorious, blazing song.

Their notes ricocheted from sky to earth and back,

vibrant echoes of a time long gone.

I can hear them now.

They cry for what was lost,

and beg for what is to come,

Just as the earth groans and cracks,

longing for the closeness of home.

To truly live is what they ask,

and I find myself asking the same,

but the truth I once suppressed is out,

You died to fix this shadowed mess,

and now to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

There are times when I cannot comprehend,

just how far and how deep Your grace has reached.

All I know is this battered, shriveled, stony heart,

is now vibrant, beating, and free.

The garden is still a foreign place,

a peaceful place that I've never known,

but that sweet and poisonous fruit still grows,

and its taste still haunts and tempts me even now.

What once was sweet now leaves a bitter sting,

its passion is a violent, potent thing.

The bite was hesitant and small,

and what's left is grossly unworthy to lift.

It drops from my guilty hands,

and I crush it into indiscernible pieces,

before I can offer it as a spiteful gift.

Lord, You are the One that hardens hearts,

and You are the One that makes them free;

Your wrath is the violent sea unleashed,

and Your mercy is the dry land beneath our feet.

You created all that is by simply speaking words,

You separated light and darkness,

You make each and every day brand new,

You paint sunsets and carve canyons,

You supersede and outperform every human artist.

You heal the sick and lame and blind,

You scatter kings and politicians,

You bring the dead to life with but a thought,

Your will is the right and true ambition.

Lord, I should be lost beneath Your vast, unmeasurable presence,

and yet You hear my broken cries again.

I've been placed into Your precious name,

in which my shameful sin is already forgiven.

I often wonder why it is,

that You would care to know my name,

that You would even care at all.

Such power, wisdom, and holy might,

should only punish a sinner so small.

But You turn ransomed sinners into light,

and bid them shine Your glory bright.


"Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?... And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God." ~ 1 Corinthians 6:9b and 11