Hike
By Jason Lefler

What's Happening?
- features
- events
- news
- art exhibits

Ministry
- children
- youth
- discipleship / ace
- communities
- missions
- worship & arts
- get connected

Resources
- theology online
- classes
- booklist
- messages & bulletins
- church calendar

The Church
- about grace
- first visit?
- service times
- staff
- contact us / map

High in the blue haze

where a hollow frowns

in the mountain's face

I curl and wait.

Gaunt trees force roots

into crags, feed

on moss drippings and weak soil.

Their want is their beauty.

I envy the trees their forced fasts,

their un-free will, their God spoken

tree-ness, resent the call

to crack open like a seed, to be coaxed

into service as a frail sapling.

Will He kneel yet again,                         

split the seed of me, burn away

rot leaving only new tendrils?

Above the valley,

a Peregrine falcon skims

the wind's sheer slope, its shadow

darting through fern and laurel.

Its flight strains my heart;

I beg God to pull me

from this rain hewn rock

and let me know again

His severe mercy.