ruminating

last night we heard the gospel of great reversal

one day...
the lame will walk
the poor will be rich
and justice will unseat oppression

last night we heard the gospel of great reversal

sweet Jesus i want to believe
help me in my unbelief

"just because we serve you, doesn't mean we like you." yet another running diary

11:21 a.m.--we are experiencing a deluge of down home customers who are scrambling out to their pickup trucks to get their credit cards, dialing 1.800.CRISTI (we just throw in the AN in our adds to sound more sacrosanct) with flaming fingers, asking us moronic questions and wanting their packages delivered yesterday. so i don't know how interesting this is going to be.

11:30 a.m.--i just had a caller from two trailers, arkansas. her locale reminded me of one of my favorite jokes.

What's the most seductive line you can utter in Arkansas?

Sis...you still awake?

11:33 a.m.--off to lunch. mmm, trader joe's burritos, of you i never tire!

11:57 a.m.--three minutes left until my entry into hell. by what slight of hand can i keep you entertained?

ok...got it. in our catalogs, all products are proceeded by two letter catalog prefix. these prefix's help us to figure out which catalog you are using, so that we can fill your mailbox with similar product offers in about a week's time. with that background, i would like to suggest that the worst two prefix's ever are...drumroll...KY and FU. the first doesn't help me to think about "whatever is pure, holy, praiseworthy, etc." and the second prefix expresses my attitude towards customers much too clearly.

the most ridiculous question a customer has ever asked me. "you sound sooo sweet? would you like to date my cousin?" my response: "um, probably not. i'm incredibly picky and probably wouldn't like her."

12:15pm--i just completed the most annoying call of the season. the customer, who obviously had nothing better to do, asked me to perform the most generalized searches in the history of man. i have included a part of the transcript below.

customer: do you have any leather bibles under $20?
  gentry: i am sure that we do. is there a particular translation that you are interested in?
customer: somethin' that is readable. not the kjv.
  gentry: like the niv?
customer: yes. do you have a niv leather bible for under $20?
  gentry: i am sure that we do. let me search for you. while i'm waiting for the results of the search i would like to encourage you to search on christianbook.com. on our site you can search for any kind of bible you would be interested in and we have a special bargain center as well!
customer: i don't have time for that. what are you finding?
  gentry: we have an niv pocket bible in leather for $19.99.
customer: no, don't want no pocket bible.
  gentry: ok. unfortunately most leather bibles cost more than $20, but i'll continue to look.

*********call eclipses the five minute mark

  gentry: actually, we do have a niv collegiate bible for $12.99. these are designed for college students, so they are not available in traditional colors. for instance, we have orange, crimson red and purple.
customer: do you have black?
  gentry: no, unfortunately it only comes in college colors.
customer: that's all you have for under $20? for real?
  gentry: ma'am, most leather bibles are more expensive than $20.
customer: i guess if that's all you have, i'll take the first one.
  gentry: ok, the niv pocket bible is the one you're intersted in.
customer: no! i want the college bible. it's for a man. what colors do you have again?
  gentry: we have orange, crimson red and purple.
customer: i'll take purple.
customer: do you have any study bibles?
  gentry: yes, we have thousands. what kind of study bible did you have in mind?
customer: an niv one. for under $20...

*********call eclipses the ten minute mark

customer: so if i ordered those, when would i be charged?
  gentry: ma'am, you would be charged as soon as we could process your credit card and start packaging your order.
customer: can you hold the order till tomorrow?
  gentry: (in his head: quit using your freaking credit card up to the limit, lady!) no, unfortunately we cannot. orders are charged almost immediately.
customer: ok, then, ok. can i have an order number?
  gentry: ma'am, you can use the stock numbers that i provided you when you call to order tomorrow.
customer: you mean i have to call again to order?
  gentry: unfortunately, we cannot place an order without a form of payment. and without placing an order, i cannot provide you with an order number.
customer: i was just thinking that they could hold my order.
  gentry: unfortunately, ma'am, we cannot. our system was not designed to hold orders, but to get them out the door as soon as possible.

************call eclipses the fifteen minute mark.

customer: do y'all have any bookmarks?

12:49: a caller rings through and when i greet her she responds with obvious contempt. i can almost hear her thinking, "i can't believe i have to deal with people in order to place a friggin order!" i think about suggesting that she use the website for quicker service, but stop myself when i realize that they probably haven't run electricity to her mississippi town just yet. i ask her for her customer number and she rattles it off as quickly as possible. i ask for her credit card number, and she does the same thing, hoping that her speed will baffle me, proving, once and for all, what an incompentent, button-pushing monkey i really am.

but i type in the numbers as quick as she says them. "humph..." she replies. she then offers me her first stock number. it is a book simply entitled, Heaven. she is lucky that judgment belongs to the Lord, i muse. then my computer locks up, so i quickly put her on hold. as she listens to the first minute of a bad contemporary christian version of a christmas carol, i know that she burns. as the second minute of the carol begins, she realizes that she's been bested. the rest of the call proceeds without a glitch.

1:08 p.m.-1:48 p.m.--between call book reviews!

i am currently reading three books. i have provided capsule reviews below:

joe dimaggio: a hero's life by Richard Ben Cramer. in the introduction to the fourth chapter, cramer explained DiMag in the following way: "he had that quiet in the bottom of himself--like an absence more than anything they could name--that made him a zero, and a sure bet. they knew joe was going to take care of business because that's all joe did."

after reading that statement i was hooked. with such a solitude of heart, it is little wonder that people were drawn to joe. they weren't attracted by a nebulous characteristic such as mystique; rather, they were attracted to a man who knew himself and was able to act out of his center. i think we all want this solitude of heart and this ability to live out of the center. that's why we are all attracted to people like joe, jesus and the buddha.

i deeply desire such solitude of heart. unfortunately, the bottom of my heart isn't quiet. it is filled with loud, obnoxious, drunken monkeys.

girl meets God by lauren winner. i found a first edition copy of winner's book in the returns barrell yesterday morning. i cracked it open this morning and was immediately attracted to her prose. within three pages, she made me long for the spanish moss and unpretentious intellectualism of oxford, mississippi, thirst for a finger of maker's mark and want to recite an ode while standing before william faulkner's headstone. i doubt that the rest of the book will disappoint.

dark night of the soul by saint john of the cross. these are deep waters. too deep to speak of here.

1:52 p.m.--i am constantly amazed by the number of people who do not know their zip code. this baffles me almost as much as people's tendency to store their credit cards in their pickup trucks.

1:55 p.m.--i'm out like ellen!

the beverly blotter

on saturday night our karoke queen and condo-mate anita brought down the the beverly citizen. the citizen is a weekly paper that reads like it was written by twelve year olds. thus, it is a constant source of entertainment.

this week we found the police blotter particularly entertaining. thus, following in the tradition of my favorite doctor, i am providing my own top five.

Top Five Entries in the Beverly Blotter:

1. Monday, November 22. "2:36 a.m. Police received a report that a person was sitting in a vehicle for 30 minutes on Essex Street."

2. "8:30 p.m. Youths reported near a Brimbal Avenue fence."

3. Tuesday, November 23. "11:17 p.m. A Thompson Road resident reported that he thought someone was in his home."

4. Wednesday, November 24. "11:16 p.m. A juvenile was throwing furniture on Kernwood Avenue."

5. Thursday, November 25. "12:59 a.m. An unknown vehicle reportedly pulled into a driveway on Trask Street."

Honorable Mention:

Friday, November 26. "3:26 p.m. Police received a report that a man with a gun shot a rat on Park Street."

"8:43 p.m. A Littleton resident reported that she lost a black fanny pack."

an advent prayer

i want you more than a cigarette
      but can't toss this pack quite yet
i don't want to trade the physical
      for the ethereal

so come ye closer
      than the smoke that's in my lungs
calm my shaky fingers
      be the heat upon my tongue

i want to act justly, love mercy, walk in humility
      but abstractions just don't do it for me.

      please come closer.

monday morning inspiration

"man is born broken. he lives by mending. the grace of God is glue."

~Eugene O'Neill, as quoted by Anne Lamott in traveling mercies

happy haiku friday!

the child's eyes brighten

revealing innate wonder

his head hits the floor

dreaming of the day when we are all more optimistic than jaded

"But darling, I wish you well
On your way to the wishing well
Swinging off of those gates of hell
But I can tell how hard you're trying
Just have that secret hope
Sometimes all we do is cope
Somewhere on the steepest slope
There'll be an endless rope and nobody crying.
~Patty Griffin, Nobody Crying

"Well I wish that you could see me when I'm flying in my dreams
The way I laugh there way up high
The way I look when I fly
The way I live...
The way I fly..."
~Patty Griffin, Chief

"And you can't run away from the nagging dark. You carry it everywhere in your heart. It finishes everything that you start. You can't run away from the nagging dark.

How far can you see? Will you ever be free? Through the blackest night, aw you still hold on tight. Hope is your finest work. It's your finest work. Hope is your finest work of all."
~John Hiatt, The Nagging Dark

many thanks to patty and john for providing an unexpected serving of lectio devina. what are some of the sacred readings that drag you through dark days?

little black books

yesterday morning was a revelation. as alex and i winged our way over cape ann, our eyes focused upon the rhythmic surf and sharp, resolute shoreline of new england, i could not help but think of my father.

i was raised in a cradle of aviation. my father recovered airplanes in our two car garage, my brother and i treated the fuselages in the backyard like playground equipment and dad often strapped the my brother and i into one of the two small seats in our aeronica chief and took us buzzing about the oklahoma countryside.

a couple of summers ago, while digging around in my dad's closet for a long-lost first baseman's mitt, i found my dad's log book. on its small pages dad had recorded every hour he had flown and, occasionally, jotted a few notes about the flights. unsurprisingly, my brother and i were his passengers for a number of those flights. beside our names, in his carefully messy script, my dad had written things like "took the boys flying today and they loved it!" and "jeff took the stick today and did quite well." these simple notations pierced my heart. for some reason, reading the notes in my dad's log book made his love more tangible than ever. in that cluttered closet i realized that my father's heart was so full of love for his boys that it overflowed into every part of his life, including his little black log book.

in much the same way, i believe that God's love for us is scribbled, in his servant's carefully messy script, all over scripture. i just wish the pages of scripture pierced my heart like the pages of that logbook did.

a thanksgiving first

after our delicious dinner kellie and bonnie suggested that we watch a movie. the men in the house knew that this was a brazen ploy to distract our attention from halo 2, but we acquiesced anyway. after a bit of half-hearted deliberation, we decided to watch when harry met sally.

immediately following the infamous delicatessen scene, mikey, who is the king of non-sequiturs, looked directly at kellie and said, "kellie, have you ever faked an orgasm?"

happy haiku friday!

the fallow fields

are re-enchanted by spring

drink equal exchange

the wonders of pixie dust and the prince of peace

when i walked out the front door of cbd last tuesday i was delighted to see my friend elijah stick his head out of a waiting car's window and offer me one of the sweetest smiles known to man. "mr. gentry! mr. gentry!" he repeated excitedly as i stuck my head in the window and asked for a kiss. after i greeted his mother elijah looked at me with instigating eyes and said, "is it time for wildboys?" then he started clapping and jumping up and down in the front seat until he cracked his forehead on the front windshield. i busted up immediately. due to his love for hockey, which results in multiple "body checks" every five minutes, and his irregular gait, which bears a striking resemblance to the sauntering of captain jack sparrow, elijah is well accustomed to sustaining such a hit. thus, he quickly laughed as well.

weekend before last, kevin and amy clark made their first visit to new england. i met k & a when i was a senior and college and kevin was a first year seminarian. after nine months together in lincoln geography tried its damnedest to divide us, but has constantly failed to succeed. thanks in large part to non-revenue tickets on AA and amy's parents' limitless hospitality our friendship has continued to deepen throughout the years. anyway, when k & a told me they were going to visit, i told them that they best bring new pictures of mayzie james, their one and a half year old daughter. otherwise, i threatened, their tour of new england might be limited to t.f. green airport. fortunately, they did better than that. they brought a video shot especially for us! on the video we got to watch our suddenly mop headed, precocious, pseudo-niece mimic the sound of animals. most of the animals were of the standard variety, but she also dealt us a wildcard. on kevin's cue, mayzie ran around the living room, flitting in and out of camera range, while hissing like a little snake.

all of this to say that i love children. for this reason, among others, i was awestruck by finding neverland. the ability of j.m. barrie to not only to recognize, but also accentuate the wild-eyed wonder of a child, reminded me of Jesus' amazing revelation that "unless you become like little children you will not see the Kingdom of God." thanks to barrie, i once again realize that i need Christ to whisper a new word into my life that reminds me that existence is both more beautiful and terrible as well as more whimsical and unexpectedly orderly than i ever imagined. i need him to widen the narrow focus and task orientation that i have defined as "maturity" and reveal to me yet again that the world is indeed enchanted. when Christ chooses to whisper, i think his word might sound something like this:

"here is your life. you might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn't have been complete without you. here is the world. beautiful and terrible things will happen. don't be afraid. I am with you. nothing can ever separate us. it's for you I created the universe. I love you." ~buechner, the alphabet of grace

to sum up: finding neverland. yeah, i kind of liked that movie.

the requisite sappy, sentimental thanksgiving post

even in this season of drought i have a number of reasons to be thankful. currently, i am thankful for:

1. my wife. i wish i could count the number of times that i catch myself staring at kellie and asking myself why a woman of such penetrating intellect, subversive beauty and enduring, earthy faith would choose to join her life with mine. my love for her knows few bounds. you heard it right, few...i will never love the learning channel or queer eye for the straight guy and no amount of stickiness or filth will ever compel me to clean the ceramic tiles in the kitchen with a toothbrush.

2. my family. my grandfather is not only a man above reproach, he is my best friend. i am not the only one who thinks so highly of him. in twenty-seven years the only negative thing i have ever heard about him concerns his driving, which is, admittedly, hurtling towards the danger zone. my practical genius father and sacrificial servant mother provided me with an ozzie and harriet environment to grow up in (too bad they were saddled with an R-rated eddie haskell for a son), provided every educational opportunity that i could ever need and continue to be my best advocates. my brother is a bastard. but then again, so am i. he is one of the most creative and endearingly quirky people i have ever met. i could go on about my grandmother who is the most gentle, accepting person i have ever met and my cousins that i love dearly (yes, including chris and my cousin-once-removed brian). i also love my dog kate. who stood proudly beside me, between kellie and i and on the couch during our first wedding (we had two since i feared the first "didn't take"). tomorrow will be my first thanksgiving away from my aunt beth's wassail, my uncle's smoked turkey and (thankfully) a smorgasbord of dallas cowboy's football.

3. let go by the "frou frou's." this song is a sacrament that is reminding me of the value and the beauty of carrying around in my body the death of Jesus (2 cor. 4:10). thanks to you, "frou frous" i am being reminded that the way up is down and there is indeed "beauty in the breakdown."

4. my strong, multi-faceted community. i once told a close friend that i often felt like a loose cannon. i had plenty of firepower and quite a bit of kick, but my shots were as unpredictable as they were dangerous. fortunately, over the past several years i have been bolted down by my beloved sinners and saints, my longsuffering sister regina, the comic troupe known as the clarks, my rufus lusting sidekick mark, my unparalleled spiritual director, blogging buddies all around the country and, though their threads should have been stripped by now, my loving wife and family. i thank God that i am no longer a loose cannon. now, if i could only get my barrel rebored...

5. my job. it isn't challenging, requires healthy doses of hypocrisy and often makes me want to curse, but it also pays for my bills, enables me to work among friends, provides remarkable scheduling and includes a boss that is willing to put up with my shit.

of course i have a number of additional reasons to be thankful, but this will do for now.

brushback pitches: hot-stove edition

now that i've burdened you with my spiritual struggles, let us turn to a discussion of my second religion: baseball (insert sound clip from the team america anthem here). these are just a few thoughts that are ricocheting through my mind right now.

• shame on major league baseball for naming the washington team "the nationals." they had the option to name the team after the washington "grays" of the negro league, thereby honoring a cherished past of baseball history and building the legend of josh gibson, but they chose instead to ride the wave of nationalistic frenzy that currently characterizes usamerica. hey, at least their colors aren't red, white and blue. wait a second... shame on you mlb, shame on you!


• speaking of mlb...one of the only upsides of a second bush term is that he won't have the opportunity to seek the commissioner's seat. here's a guy who by most accounts wasn't allowed to fiddle with the day to day operations of the texas rangers. and he wants to be commissioner of our national pastime? right. i'll continue to do my best to quench my criticism of bush's presidency, but if he ever attains the commissioner's seat, the gloves are coming off.


• i am glad that fans are finally realizing that sammy sosa is a childish whiner and all around mal-content. if a star player has problems with dusty baker, the prototypical player's manager, you know something is seriously wrong. i hope that he either rots in chicago's six hole or is shipped to flushing this winter. the new york post is probably one of the only organizations that is advocating the mets acquisition of sosa. think of the fodder.
  
• speaking of whiny dominicans, if the sox end up falling for this transparent steinbrenner/pedro ploy and guarantee him three years at 40 million, they're nuts. they would be much better served by spending the same money on pavano and a three man like radke/milton/lieber. count me among those who would be thrilled to see pedro go to the yankees. then we could unabashedly root for him to blow his cuff. (sidenote: if pedro includes the services of his dominican midget in his contract negotiations, my opinion might change).


• espn reports that the cardinals are not sure that they will be able to land rj so they are going hard after eric milton. i find this news more than mildly disturbing. if they can't get rj they should offer calero/haren/ankiel for hudson. assuming, of course, that they can get huddy to sign a contract extension before coming over. if our "big pickup" this off-season is milton, we are going to be left with a #2 guy, three #3 starters and a warm body in the #5 hole. that rotations will win a lot of games, but won't take the series.


• scott boras is one of the worst things to ever happen to baseball.


• if someone can get alou to sign a 2 year/12 million kind of deal or even a 2/16 they are going to get one hell of a bargain. expect him to go to the giants, where he could provide adequate protection for #25.

i am an unbeliever

i believe that you sent your Son among us, that he was born of a virgin, crucified for purposes both religious and political, and rose victorious three days later. i also believe that His death was the perfect sacrifice for our sin and a powerful invitation to enter the Kingdom that is now and not yet.

but i don't believe that you are calling me to a cross. i don't "always carry around in my body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus might be revealed in my body" (ii cor. 4:10). so, instead of responding to your call and picking up the cross i pour my energy into trivial pursuits and set aside the cross in order to enjoy yet another hour of leisure.

i realize that it is meaningless to confess Christ with my tongue if i refuse to incarnate that confession. and i realize that a life of incarnation demands that i carry the cross.

Lord God, i want to believe in the call of Jesus. help me in my unbelief. through the agency of your Spirit, enable me to incarnate the confession i often repeat by choosing to pick up the cross. teach me how to carry the death of Jesus in my body so that he might be truly revealed in my life and in the life of my community. Jesus died so that others might live. please lead me down a similar path.

an unexpected harvest

i am barren. the field of my heart, which once produced a sustainable, if not bountiful, crop now lies completely fallow.

due to the dearth of production i am tempted to despair. i regularly find myself standing on the edge of the field where i smoke camel lights, occasionally piss on the soil and try to discern what went wrong. has the acidity of disobedience tainted my soil for good? has the salt water of sin, which courses through my heart and steadily drips from my tongue rendered the field useless? or is the field merely awaiting the sharp blade of another plowman who can furrow deeper and plant more fertile seed?

answers are allusive. so, as my eyes well up with tears, i strike another match and light another camel. i realize that on the solitary fringe of my heart there is little solace to be found. yet, i am neither completely famished nor devoid of hope. for, during this barren period, i am able to subsist on the fruit of a larger field, of which i am merely a tenant. fortunately, the oddly misshapen and bruised fruit of that field has not failed to provide the sustenance that i need.

thank God for the misshapen, and wholly unexpected, produce of the larger field. after years of living solely off the fruit of my field, i am finally realizing that i am dependant upon other resources to survive.

happy haiku friday!

confined in a cube

a monkey pushes buttons

then throws shit at rhys


note to the easily offended: i didn't actually say shit. i merely spelled it.

link-a-matic

last night, after reading the sports guy's links page more carefully, i realized that gary wayne rodgers committed suicide about a week ago. it is one thing to laugh at the living, but another to desecrate the memory of the dead. thus, this link has been removed.

for more quirky links, visit the sports guy page.

to go, or not to go. that is the question

last week kevin and amy clark, two of my favorite people, came out to visit. between conversations that fluctuated from the absurd (including their tale of naughty middle schoolers who have been nicknamed "the fondeleros") to the significant (including discussions of how our sociological and ecclesiological place influences our interpretation of the gospel as well as the particular method that my Dr. used to assess the state of my prostate) amy mentioned that she had recently attended her ten year high school reunion. i condescendingly asked her if she was joking and she assured me that she was not. apparently, she even geared up for this shindig by visiting that snotty little republic and sharpening her, already formidable, claws in preparation for engagements with long-time adversaries. i punctuated her story by teasing her about attending such a meaningless affair until kevin rose to her defense. apparently he is going to attend his reunion as well.

in an attempt to both empathize with their decisions and to develop an appropriate response to the reunion invitation that i will undoubtedly receive this spring, i have decided to weigh the pros and cons of attending the ten-year reunion of Bishop Kelley's class of 1995.

first, since i am ever the optimist, i will consider the pros:

1. attending the reunion would provide an opportunity to key the h2s, lexus suvs and bmw3 series that the trust fund babies received from their parents.

2. after locating another marginalized, jaded soul we could play a game of plastic surgery "i spy." i can picture the joy of this competition in my head..."i spy a rhinoplasty." "i spy a britney job." "i spy a bo-tox injection!"

3. the freshman baseball team from 1992 could gather together and tell inappropriate jokes about our pedophilia stained baseball skipper and baptist deacon, coach webber. my first joke, due to unexpected pangs of conscience, has been edited.

4. i could finally discover whether paul finally came all the way out of the closet and wrote the script for "angels in america" under an assumed name.

5. i could drink alcohol with my classmates without receiving an m.i.p. (minor in possession) and smoke within 50 feet of school grounds without being fined $100. however, using the lingering incense in the school chapel to cloak the meeting of the 420 club would probably still be prohibited.

now, and you knew they were coming, the cons:

1. most of my friends in high school weren't in my class. in fact, most of them lived in canada...you wouldn't know them.

2. i could avoid conversations about my vocation without being interrupted by comments like "you became a pastor?" "what is it like? some kind of cult?" to which my response would be that (1) God has a sense of humor and (2) the boston church of christ congregation i lead is not a cult. just kidding...God doesn't have a sense of humor.

3. i don't have a pink oxford shirt of pair of navy blue dockers in my wardrobe. furthermore, while i thought cowboy boots with slacks were the "bomb" in 1995, i wouldn't be caught dead "duding up" now.

4. my failure to make the varsity baseball team is up near the top of my list of regrets. i can live without conversations about how i drilled fritz with 3 out of 5 batting practice pitches or about the time i got tossed out of edison field for using one of my favorite words.

5. i cannot endure another night of Bishop Kelley girls killing me softly with the blight on humanity that is known as karaoke. even if alcohol is involved...

at this point, i'm thinking that the cons outweigh the pros. but only time will tell how i will respond to that eagerly awaited invitation.

"There are two kinds of people in this world: Those that enter a room and turn the television set on, and those that enter a room and turn the television set off." ~Raymond Shaw in the original Manchurian Candidate

unfortunately, i am one of the latter. baseball tonight and back-to-back-to-back episodes of law and order are my kryptonite.

listening with a lump in my throat

as i settled into my cube this morning i instinctively reached for my pile of scratched cds. recently i have been relying on audiobooks to help wisk me through the day, but after a bad experience with 'sense and sensibility' (i know it's considered a classic, but my disdain for 20th century chick-lit apparently extends well into the 19th) i quickly returned to the tunes.

anyway, as i shuffled through the cds in a vain attempt to locate ben folds' rockin' the suburbs (i have been singing gone in my head all weekend), i ran across indelible grace, a cd that i lifted from a friends wallet sometime ago. indelible grace is a beautiful collection of reframed hymns (same lyrics with a new americana sound) that was crafted by the numerous musicians at Christ Community Church in jesusland, tennessee.

after the third track, entitled "i need thee every hour," brought tears to my eyes, i realized that, on this day, indelible grace was a sacrament i needed to receive. uncle buechner has always encouraged me to be aware of the times that i have a lump in my throat or a tear in my eye, for those are probably times that God is working. since the third track on the album inspired both a lump and the aforementioned tears, i listened to it again and again.

i thought you might find the lyrics of this old baptist hymn beneficial. then again, you might not.

i need thee every hour

I need Thee every hour,
Most gracious Lord;
No tender voice like Thine
Can peace afford.

Refrain:
I need Thee, O I need Thee;
Every hour I need Thee;
O bless me now, my Saviour,
I come to Thee.

I need Thee every hour,
Stay Thou near by;
Temptations lose their power
When Thou art nigh.

I need Thee every hour,
In joy or pain;
Come quickly and abide,
Or life is vain.

I need Thee every hour;
Teach me Thy will;
And Thy rich promises
In me fulfill.

I need Thee every hour,
Most Holy One;
O make me Thine indeed,
Thou blessed Son!
~Annie Sherwood Hawks, 1835-1918

may God grant us the courage to repent of our independent streaks so that we can grow into a deeper dependence upon Him and a deeper interdependence with one another.