If Only I Could

 

If only I could speak

I would tell you I am dumb

Neither do I have feelings

I am totally numb.

 

If only I could see

The many things I own

The many things you offer me;

I don’t even hear you groan.

 

If only I could hear

I would tell you I am deaf,

I cannot hear a word you say,

Of hearing I am bereft.

If only I could move

I would come to you sometime

Just to let you know

I do not even have a mind.

 

If only I could appreciate

The praise you give to me,

I would shout it out aloud

I am an absolute nobody!

 

I am dependent on you,

Actually you are my source,

Even in spite of you

I still lack the life force.

I can do absolutely nothing

Nothing at all for you,

You express an idea, an opinion;

I don’t even have a view.

 

Yet you come to me often

Knowing that you are the cause

Why I exist in the first place,

Take a moment and pause.

 

If only I could have a moment

One single life-given minute

I would tell to you your folly

But even then you’d still not quit.

You worship what you create

As though it created you,

Bowing before the created

What a silly thing to do!

 

You pray to me for rain

That will cause the crops to grow,

But there is no life in me

And this I’m sure you know.

 

I sit or stand in one place

Oft in a temple you create

And whether I am clean or dusty

You determine my state.

 

I’ll tell you of an experience

I had a long time ago,

It’s the nearest I came to living

From head down to my toe.

 

I resided in a temple

A temple named after me,

There I sat upon my throne

So that my people there could see.

 

They had won a great battle

And had taken the ark of God,

They had brought it from Ebenezer

To my temple at Ashdod.

 

That night I was disturbed

By morning I had fallen down,

It seemed I bowed in worship

To the ark that was around.

 

I was put upon my throne

And there I sat again

But the second successive night

Found me in greater pain.

This time I fell upon my face

Before the ark of the Lord,

My head and palms were cut off

 By the Almighty God.

 

There is really no other God

The people discovered that day,

His hand brought their destruction

They had contravened His way.

 

Today He is still the same

His power is no less, no more,

If only I had the life you have

His name alone I would adore.

If only I could speak

And if only I could hear,

If only I could see

I would bow to God in reverential fear.

 

But Alas, I am only an image

Inanimate and lifeless

But yet you pay to me homage;

What an awful human mess!

 

Stewart Russell © May 2019

 

Is This Day Upon Us?

 

 

“I fear the day that technology will surpass our human interaction.

The world will have a generation of idiots.”

Albert Einstein (1870-1955)

 

Just Asking

 

Pertaining to this quote I really wish I could give you

The exact day and time

And what was foremost on the mind

Of this luminary, Albert Einstein.

 

The aspect of the technology then

That could have prompted Einstein’s quote

That today, February 28, 2021,

Could strike such a chilling note.

 

There is no comparison, I dare say,

Between his era and ours

Regarding the technological advances

Especially that of computers. 

And yet he had a morbid fear

That such a day would come

When technology would gain the ascendancy

And put human interaction on the run.

 

I ask, is this day upon us?

Has technology become the go-to tool?

Are we relegated to idiocy?

Have we in fact become as fools?

 

 

And what of the great minds

That created the technology?

Have they now become less intelligent?

Is this our inevitable eulogy?

 

And what of the world’s leaders

In that idiotic generation?

Will they place more trust in technology

Than across the table interaction?

 

A generation of idiots!

And what of the offspring of these?

Will there be a change or more of the same?

What are the possibilities?

 

When the created replaces the creator

That’s the pinnacle of lunacy,

No doubt the brilliant Albert Einstein

Feared such an eventuality.

 

 

His quote presupposes the “when”

Certainly, more so that the “if”,

It appeared to be only a matter of time,

If you catch my drift.

 

Is this day upon us?

Is it swiftly drawing near?

That COVID-19 is a major indicator

To us should be very clear.

 

Here is another Einstein quote

I believe fits perfectly here,

The technology lacks one of the following

To me this is very clear.

 

You can determine which one

I will finish with the quote,

Just bear in mind that one without the other

Is murder she wrote.

 

“Science without religion is lame,

Religion without science is blind.”

Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

 

Stewart Russell © February 28, 2021

 

By the way:

Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.

Aristotle (384-422 BC)

 

The Old Rugged Cross

 

This one I have left for last

The most insignificant of them all,

That is how it first appeared

But no longer to the called.

Nothing like those crucifixes

That are worn around the neck

But the means to crucify the Saviour

When they perceived a threat.

For the ordinary criminal

It was rough and crude and heavy,

For Jesus it was no different

And as he bore it, he became unsteady.

He fell beneath its weight

As he trudged the Calvary road

And the long distance he had to bear it

Seemingly increased the load.

He was despised and rejected

And was crucified on that cross

And none of his tormentors recognized

It was because they were lost.

 

So insignificant was the cross

And the person who hung therefrom

That they mocked and ridiculed the Christ

Taunting him to come down.

For me, for you, he died,

An eternal debt he paid

And now because of that wonderful cross

Thank God we are eternally saved.

The created had borne its Creator

A most incongruous sight,

But when he said it’s finished,

From there issued a glorious light.

 

Tidings of great joy-

That cross became for us,

On it the Saviour bled and died

In the person of the Lord Jesus.

Despise not small things;

They accomplish the greatest acts

And if you are not in the way of the cross,

It is time you get on track.

Stewart Russell © June 2020