Like children ever are we

7 6 7 6

Like children ever are we
if we look far beneath
our labour’d expectation
to be the first, not least.
Complexities weigh deeper
upon the modern mind.
But we like children longing
simplicity to find.

To hear the voice of Jesus,
to come and so suspend
disciples’ cold indifference
to our dawn ‘till our end.
The day you called the children
awakens us and shows
you name us ever yours Lord
your calm embrace to know.

Like children ever are we
and so are all in need
of help and health and healing
of kind word, good deed.
Your arms extend God’s kingdom,
your touch divine caress,
O Christ, you come among us,
and offer all deep rest.

J. Gregory Davidson

on the occasion of the Memorial Window Dedication in memory of Shirley Douglas at Briarwood Presbyterian Church, 28 June 2009.

God, who lit across this country

God, who lit across this country
Leaving wonders, leaving cold;
God, who walked when North was nowhere
Landscaped mysteries untold.

With your toes you nudged the glaciers;
Shaping hard the stony shield.
With your breath you cooled the tundra,
Clouds with rain for prairie yield.

By your hand that holds three oceans,
Piled the mountains in a day.
Tracing with a single finger,
Rivers, streams – one watery way.

God, whose footsteps left a promise
Now fulfilled in lakes deep blue.
God, who crossed Canadiana
Thank you for this glimpse of you.

J. Gregory Davidson
27 June 2008

O Christ of Mary

O Christ of Mary
8 8 8 8

O Christ of Mary, Israel’s son,
Through her incarnate have become,
Through flesh as human as can be,
Through her for all humanity.

Within her, God on earth to dwell;
She carries the Immanuel.
In faith she bears God’s holy Son;
Divine and human, both in one.

To God voice raised with pregnant cry,
Her Kuriou she magnifies.
With God in her is Mary blessed;
Her own womb holds God’s promised Rest.

O Christ, like Mary, so may we,
Our lives to praise and work for thee.
For we too bear the Christ within;
By grace alone, where all begins.

by J. Gregory Davidson
Advent 2005

Holding the Messiah

Holding the Messiah
8 6 8 6

The hoped for child in aged hands,
The child that moves and sways,
The world to look toward God again,
The Consolation of all days.

This Tide has only come with time;
O Israel to wait.
Fulfillment after darkened days,
In Light the nations wake.

To hold this Ocean in his arms,
Each drop his eyes drink in,
Messiah rests in his embrace,
God’s All with Simeon.

God’s All, the Christ, is in our midst,
Like Anna celebrate.
Now hold him in the good we see,
He’s here, but still we wait.

Like Simeon we wait with faith,
Until that final day;
Christ’s waves of Consolation come,
All waiting washed away.

J. Gregory Davidson
Epiphany 2006