Archive for The Gathering Place "The Gathering Place" is a web community where people can gather and make new friends, share ideas, enjoy a few laughs and learn about many interesting things together. It is a safe place where friends can correspond with each other about what they love.
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God's Warrior
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Christmas Poems by Nicholas GordonI'm Your Christmas Tree, All Brightly Lit
Nicholas Gordon
I'm your Christmas tree, all brightly lit,
Hung with angels, colored balls, and elves.
Underneath my boughs your presents sit,
If you've behaved yourselves.
Why must we wait till early Christmas morn
To open up our brand-new games and toys?
Why gifts for us the day that Christ was born
If we're good girls and boys?
Now listen to your Christmas tree: I'm wise
In all the ways of faith that you must know.
I'm here because of what I symbolize:
Green through ice and snow.
There is a world beyond what we can see
Where, by grace of God, we can receive
God's greatest gift: to live eternally,
If only we believe.
Eternal life is what God gave to you
In sending down His son to live on Earth.
This was His gift, so Santa brings gifts, too,
To celebrate Christ's birth.
The baby Jesus got gifts on this day
Because, like any child, He loved to play.
And so God wants to share this special joy
With every girl and boy.
Believe God loves you as your parents do,
And takes great joy in giving gifts to you.
Live well and love, and evergreen like me,
You'll live eternally.
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God's Warrior
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If All Were Now as It Was When
Nicholas Gordon
If all were now as it was when
Christ came to save us all,
And Christmas Day were Christmas Day,
Not some day we recall;
And in the East we saw a star
Exceptionally bright,
And wondered what was going on
That ordinary night;
If God were walking in our midst,
Saying what He said,
And we were not His followers,
But trod where He would tread;
And we were witness to His word
And looked Him in the eye,
And found His message interesting
But too bizarre to buy;
If we were in Jerusalem
And watched Him bear the cross,
And suffered with His suffering
But feared to share His loss;
And saw Him die in agony,
And wondered at it all,
And this were something we ourselves,
Not printed books, recall:
What would be the difference,
Had we known Him that way,
Between the faith we feared to feel
And what we fear today?
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God's Warrior
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May You Find This Christmas Inner Peace
Nicholas Gordon
May you find this Christmas inner peace
Equal to the patient love you give,
Releasing all the pain you can release,
Renewing all the grace with which you live.
Yearnings may you turn to rhapsodies,
Choosing to find happiness in beauty,
Holding in their haunting melodies
Riches that sustain your sense of duty.
In anger may you find an evening star
Showing you the way to Bethlehem.
The angels that watch naked from afar
May you hear sing of who would none condemn.
As all you love are blessed in having you
So may you feel the joy in all you do.
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God's Warrior
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Miracles Have a Way of Making News
Nicholas Gordon
Miracles have a way of making news.
Even skeptics stare at parted seas.
Religious or not--Christians, Muslims, Jews--
Resurrection brings them to their knees!
Years ago, miracles were in vogue:
Christ and Moses wowed the willing crowds;
Holy icons healed both saint and rogue;
Rare wonders were ascribed to cups and shrouds.
In our time miracles are everyday,
So few can hope to grab us, or astound.
The mysteries that clutter up our way
May seem much more perplexing than profound.
And yet life is miraculous: to be
Surpasses any wonder we might see.
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God's Warrior
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Mothers Mean Much More on Christmas Day
Nicholas Gordon
Mothers mean much more on Christmas day,
Even though they're loved the whole year round.
Rich memories lie knee-deep on the ground,
Recalling years when gifts unopened lay,
Years of Christmases near wild with play,
Christmases of dreams unwrapped and crowned,
Happiness with wings and joy unbound,
Reveling in myths time would betray.
In you there lies the spirit of pure giving,
Sweetness that finds pleasure in my smile,
The gift I can reopen every year.
More than my own, I find your heart forgiving,
A home where I am welcome all the while,
So I can rest assured, for you are near.
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God's Warrior
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Mysteries Are Often Most Mundane
Nicholas Gordon
Mysteries are often most mundane.
Every child is a child of God.
Revelation tends to come roughshod,
Rudely lying in, in Bethlehem.
Yet if God walked the Earth and then was slain,
Coming, like us all, encased in sod,
His holiness wrapped wholly in a clod,
Reason could not such a case sustain.
In faith alone can miracles be true,
Summoned to a certain time and place
To crack the mountain open to its well.
Mysteries hide Being from our view
As some go out to greet it face to face.
So it was one time in Israel.
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God's Warrior
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Myths Are Hopes Refracted Through Our Pain
Nicholas Gordon
Myths are hopes refracted through our pain:
Each ray of justice bends into a bow
Resplendent, pure, symmetrical and sane,
Resolving into grace the world we know.
Yes, God walked among us out of love;
Christ suffered horribly that we might live;
His holy spirit watches, as a dove
Remains aloft, to witness and forgive.
In love the earth returns a special fire:
Sapphires linger in disheveled grass;
The snow burns eagerly; the blood runs higher;
Mountains melt into astonished brass.
All who love revere this sacred art,
Stunned and weeping at joy's battered heart.
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God's Warrior
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No Christmas for My Children
Nicholas Gordon
No Christmas for my children,
No husband for my bed,
No money for tomorrow,
No place to lay my head,
No tree with mounds of presents,
No ornaments or lights,
No smiles on Christmas morning,
No feast on Christmas night,
No toys to ease the boredom
Of hours before closed doors,
No family celebrations,
No trips to crowded stores,
No fireplace, no Santa,
No games aglow with friends,
No fire but feeble fury
As Christmas slowly ends.
For me I have no pity,
My sorrow stronger proves,
Because for my sweet children
I've nothing but my love.
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God's Warrior
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Pets Are for Life, Not Just for Christmas
Nicholas Gordon
Pets are for life, not just for Christmas.
Each of us waits for the joy of a home.
Take one of us in and you'll never go kissless,
So long as you treat us as one of your own.
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God's Warrior
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Though This May Be Our Christmas Last
Nicholas Gordon
Though this may be our Christmas last,
It is a time of cheer.
We dance within a theater vast,
Yet live from year to year.
All that we have shared remains
Within when we are gone,
Just as a house, though long since dust,
Might well remain a home.
And so we lift this glass of joy
Once more on Christmas Eve,
For time ought not such times destroy,
Nor gifts untimely leav
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God's Warrior
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When Death Must Come at Christmastime
Nicholas Gordon
When death must come at Christmastime,
There is a special grief,
A mourning that must mix with joy,
A pain that must be brief.
There is an anguish underneath
The labyrinth of light
That longs for simple emptiness
To contemplate the night.
But life must bubble on its way
And pleasure be put on,
For neither sorrow nor delight
Is ever left alone.
And, like the Virgin, we must smile
With enigmatic grace
As we receive the fragile gift
That nothing can replace.
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