The Twelve Are Alive In Me
There are
days
when it
feels
as though
all the twelve
live in
this poor disciple’s heart.
For, depending
on the moment’s mystery
each has
his place and his preaching
is heard in
my soul.
Peter is
present
A rock and
foundation stone
thrice
cleft by betrayal
and
cleansed by tears at
cockcrow
but fitting
fully now nonetheless,
this rough
fisherman of grace,
overawed at
Love that does not depart
in the
presence of sin
or even self
satisfied importance,
but teaches
patiently
through the
impetuosity
of one who
would
build tents
to contain heaven
on a hill,
and swing a
leg over the side
to begin
the water walk of wonder
until storm
tossed seas
recall a
quavering heart to the lesson of humility
and later
call “Quo Vadis?”
to One
whose way he will follow to
an upside
down end.
O yes.
Peter is
present in me.
Andrew
beckons too,
the
announcer of the Lord.
First
called and first to call others
“Come!”
he cries in
me, “I have found Him!”
And this is
the life of Andrew in me
finding and
losing and finding again;
only to
lose again so that I may call others to
the finding
in their turn,
and in that
struggle to perhaps
at the last,
find all that I have longed for
and sought
in every teacher;
the One
from whom the knowledge comes,
the One who
is the Wisdom of the Ages
the Lamb
walking wild towards His
Paschal
place while saying all the while
“Come and
See…”
“Come and
See…”
O yes.
Andrew is present in me.
The Sons of
Thunder have their place in me,
brothers
both and twice blessed
James and
John; lions of the Lord,
tamed
slowly into Apostles of
Mercy and
Love;
they shine
the light
on all
unreconciled in me,
all that is
yet to yield
to the
gentleness of grace,
transforming
fire into fire,
light into
light, they smoulder within
until
finally alight, the mystic flame
burns away
my blindness
and gives
the eagle’s eye,
the
pilgrim’s staff
to see and
walk the way
beyond the
way
of this
world
Matthew
dwells here too.
Tax Collector,
Publican,
who yet holds
the priestly name
too in his
heart, even in his broken days.
Forgiven
his compromise
with the
world and called clean
from the
heart of horror
by One who
sudden stands unbidden
in the
midst of the unclean place
to cleanse
and call.
His story
told me to hope
that I too
could be called
not once
only but daily
from the
hard taxation
of sin’s slavery
and its
distractions to become
a living
Gospel
of His
grace
evangelising
all
in
exultation
over mercy
found, not once only,
but many
times,
where even
the tale of my betrayals
becomes a
blessed gate to grace
for all who
hear.
O yes.
Matthew is present in me.
Philip and
Bartholomew
Brothers of
the road
and
companions
on the way
are found
in me.
Spirit led
preachers and questioners too
seeking
wisdom’s light and imparting
wisdom’s
blessings all in the power of
the Word.
In their
pain they preached
and
fulfilled their longing
to see with
their own eyes
and touch
with their own hands.
They teach
the lesson of being open to Angels
met upon
the road in all the disguises
of grace,
stepping lightly and not long upon the earth
they dance
across deserts and invite me
to flow
freely in faith
O yes.
Philip and Bartholomew are present in me.
Thomas too
is here,
sometimes
still appearing as
Didymus the
Doubter;
needing the
touch of truth,
the gaping
wound that proves Love’s
Labour
birthing blessedness in blindness.
Yet also,
and more often
he in me
affirms faith and its freedom
describing
divinity in mystery
and Lordship
in light
touching
presence, yes
by becoming
the very vessel
in which is
seen and heard
the One who
is the face
of the
Father.
O yes.
Thomas is present in me.
Three come
forward now
Each with
their own share
Of me, in
me, with me,
Simon,
James and Jude
Of the
first two named
I owe the
allegiance of the east,
for into
the sun rise they walked
their way
of faith together
once healed
of the heaviness
of seeming
loss and ruin on Calvary’s Cross.
In its sign
they bought with their blood too
the
blessing of a harvest
still to be
reaped, not just in distant lands
but in this
my soul that lies too often in darkness
and yearns
for resurrection dawn.
Of the
third what can I say
but that
his gift is hope, perhaps
the
greatest grace of all save love,
but can
love be kindled
save at
hope’s hearth?
He too lived
his hope unto the gates of Heaven
where hope
fades into faith’s fulfilment
and where I
pray each day these noble three
may yet
bring me and all I love safely home.
O yes.
Simon and James and Jude are present in me.
And yes…
There is a
Judas place
in which I
am the betrayer,
whose faith
is so frail
it cannot
imagine a mercy
wide enough
for me
and hurtles
instead headlong
through
temptation’s tumult
to bestow a
kiss,
by which
the silver coin of self
turns to
doubt’s dust
in an
unknowing dawn, a mere second away from resurrection
May I be
saved from it by this sacred knowing that
O yes.
Judas is present in me.
But there
is too a blessedness in me,
though not
of me,
that
kindles faith and hope and love
even in the
face of my own weary weakness,
and calls
me yet, as they were called
from out
the ordinary occupation of the day to know
that these
Apostles, all alive in me,
are spokes
of one great wheel of love,
that turns
the stars and drives the sun across the sky
and pours
upon us the uncreated light by which we see the light!
Known to
those twelve first as Rabbi, then as Christ, and finally as Lord,
He lights
my way, loves me and all that is
into the
blessing of being
and asks me
now, as then he asked, and he now asks you,
“Will you not come and see?”
O yes. He
is present in me.
