Is It All Right?

 

 

Is it all right

For God’s so-called chosen

To threaten another of His creation

With genocidal extinction?

Is it all right?

 

Is it all right

For God’s so-called chosen

To commit heinous war crimes

Causing another’s starvation?

Is it all right?

 

Is it all right

For God’s so-called chosen

To kill women and children in war?

Don’t you see a problem?

Is it all right?

 

Is it all right

To deprive the enemy of food

And obstruct those Samaritans

That are doing good?

Is it all right?

 

Does being chosen

Give the chosen the right

To do whatever the chosen like

Albeit in a battle or fight?

Is it all right?

 

 

Is it all right

For supporters of God’s chosen

To turn a blind-eye to atrocities

Levelled against other humans?

Is it all right?

 

Is it all right

For Christians to be complicit

And support God's so-called chosen

In what is clearly illegitimate?

 

All is well in love and war

States a popular maxim

So is it all right to pulverize another

And argue it cannot be sin.

Is it all right? 

 

Whose are the Japanese

And whose are the Chinese?

For if only Israel are God’s chosen

Then whose are these?

 

Is it all right

To live in the old covenant

Disregarding Jesus’ shed blood

In his act of atonement?

Is it all right?

 

Who gives God’s chosen

The unlimited authority

To behave in a despicable manner

Lacking in civility?

 

What has become of

Do good to everyone

And if your enemy hungers

Feed him?

 

 

Is it all right

For God’s so-called chosen

To completely disregard God’s Son

And still be forgiven?

Is it all right?

 

Me thinks absolutely not

According to God’s Holy Word!

And any that supports such evil

Is contemptuously absurd.

 

Stewart Russell © March 4, 2024

 

We Need an Answer

 

 

What’s wrong with our team?

Pray tell!

For a while now

We are not doing well.

 

Oh, we look stylish, though,

And we hit many sixes

But the remedies we employ

Are surely not fixes.

 

I heard via social media

We had a new administrator

But after reading to the end

I burst out in laughter.

 

He was a Chinese,

Win Won Soon was his name

And immediately on his selection

We won the next game.

 

 

We beat a team badly-

Bottom of the table, Oman,

Hiring this Chinese expert

Seemed a good plan.

 

Of course, it was a fluke

As bajans would say

And immediately we returned

To our losing ways.

 

Cricket was a way of life

In the Caribbean

And for many, many years

Ours was a great team.

 

Nowadays all we can do

Is just reminisce

About the great players we had

That we sorely miss.

 

 

George Headley, Sir Garry,

Sir Vivian and Brian

Are just about four at this time

That I would mention.

 

Around these four

There’s much cricket folklore

But those who know

Know there are many more.

 

How the mighty has fallen

And to such great depths!

Rock-bottom has been surpassed

We are such a wreck!

 

Nothing seems to work

And blame is cast everywhere

Whereupon I sometimes wonder

Do they really care?

 

We need an answer

But none is forth coming,

Administrators, coaches and players,

Better we are demanding.

 

It might even be better

To pull out for a while

For right now this slapdash affair

Is not Caribbean style.

 

It hurts to the stomach

And up in the head too

And almost every game we play

Is a colossal boo-boo.

 

Winning is the exception

And at very rare times too

And everyone is lost and clueless

Not knowing what to do.

 

 

I bet the ice-cream man

Only yesterday

That the game with the Indians

Would end that same day…

 

And that we won’t exceed

Our first innings score,

That is exactly what happened

Need I say more?

 

We need an answer

And we need an answer fast!

However, don’t hold your breath

Or you’d surely pass.

 

Stewart Russell © July 15, 2023

 

Beware the Devil’s Deception

A sprat to catch a whale

And what a whale of a catch!

That is the devil’s offering

And on to it we often latch.

Divisiveness is the sprat

Distraction is the lure

The damnation of the human soul

In spite of the Father’s cure.

The asides become the issues

And we major on the minors

And progressively the argument

Descends into ethnicity and colour.

How unfortunate the blacks!

How highly favoured the whites!

And God’s chosen people, the Jews,

Yet all languish in sin’s plight.

The Indians and the Arabs

The Chinese and the Japanese

All are destitute and naked

And afflicted by sin’s disease.

What has colour to do with it?

What has ethnicity or race?

It matters not our status or station

We are steeped in sin’s disgrace.

It’s not man’s colour but his heart

It’s not his status but his state,

It’s not his identity but Jesus Christ

That can rid him of such racial hate.

We are children of the same parents

Whether we believe this or not,

We all are offspring of Adam and Eve

And therefore one family is our lot.

It is either that or some animal:

Perhaps the monkey, the ape or chimp,

It’s up to you the choice you make

You decide how far you will sink.

  

The colour is red; the heart is white

That’s dipped in the Saviour’s blood

Christ for our crisis, Christ for our creed

Only he can change our heart

And make us good.

Superficiality is just what it is

It is only just skin deep,

Right after that the colour is red

Unless of course you’ve fallen asleep.

No such problems in the grave

It matters not sprat or whale,

If Jesus was not your Saviour and Lord

Nothing beyond death will avail.

Stewart Russell © February 2019

Beware the Devil’s Deception

A sprat to catch a whale

And what a whale of a catch!

That is the devil’s offering

And on to it we often latch.

Divisiveness is the sprat

Distraction is the lure

The damnation of the human soul

In spite of the Father’s cure.

The asides become the issues

And we major on the minors

And progressively the argument

Descends into ethnicity and colour.

How unfortunate the blacks!

How highly favoured the whites!

And God’s chosen people, the Jews,

Yet all languish in sin’s plight.

The Indians and the Arabs

The Chinese and the Japanese

All are destitute and naked

And afflicted by sin’s disease.

What has colour to do with it?

What have ethnicity or race?

It matters not our status or station

We are steeped in sin’s disgrace.

It’s not man’s colour but his heart

It’s not his status but his state,

It’s not his identity but Jesus Christ

That can rid him of such racial hate.

We are children of the same parents

Whether we believe this or not,

We all are offspring of Adam and Eve

And therefore one family is our lot.

It is either that or some animal:

Perhaps the monkey, the ape or chimp,

It’s up to you the choice you make

You decide how far you will sink.

  

The colour is red; the heart is white

That’s dipped in the Saviour’s blood

Christ for our crisis, Christ for our creed

Only he can change our heart

And make us good.

Superficiality is just what it is

It is only just skin deep,

Right after that the colour is red

Unless of course you’ve fallen asleep.

No such problems in the grave

It matters not sprat or whale,

If Jesus was not your Savior and Lord

Nothing beyond death will avail.

Stewart Russell © February 2019