Reformer's Smile

Where is your smile?
Oh, lover of sovereign grace...

Does your life know laughter?
Your wife know care?
Your children know a father
That shadows God, though heart unaware?

You of all men,
should be of them most happy.
Jovial, hospitable and warm.
Not for sake of companion,
but from Joy adorned.

You, who boast of sacred doctrine of old...
What would Zwingli say of your dispositions?
Or, dear Luther of your tone in Sunday's exposition?
Would Calvin sigh at your heart's critical malposition?
Or, Huss weep at your aim for a superior position.

What of man's depravity, fuels your tone?
Or, of undeserved election makes the heart cold?
Beautiful grace, do you claim as your own,
Without joy in God's people atoned?
Perhaps it is faith persevered,
that has killed your love song.

I fear that too often we know about God,
but never stop to ask...Do we believe?
Maybe that is why laughter finds such reprieve.

I dare not say we be perfect nor near divine,
Only that we must guard against this error...
That with all our thinking on theology,
We forget it's pursuit, our Sin Bearer.

Let us repent, let us reform.
Cry to God that your heart be warmed.

Blind

Arrayed in splendor, Oh High King,
The mountains bow at your majesty!
Glories unknown to the children of man,
All of creation holds together by your hand.

Still we catch glimpses of your beauty,
Those who have new eyes to see.
Stars echo your fame, your glory the ocean can't contain,
Birds sing your praises on refrain, even our lying heart proclaims
That we've all come to be by the power of your Name.

So many look, by do not see...
So many taste, but do not know...
The beauty and delight of life are but shadows
Of Him whose name is forever hallowed.

Look closer at creation, oh child of man!
When your child is born,
When you gaze at the heavens,
See Him who has no end!

See Him, the glorious Lord!
Christ Jesus, the savior of the World!

Romans 1:18-21