From here I can see tomorrow,

From here I can see the shore,

From here I can see the future,

But I ask myself, what for?

Somewhere between curse and blessing

Between help and hindrance

Is knowing what’s coming

Preparing for the dance.

Would you want to know the outcome,

If it turned out you would lose?

Would you want to know the verdict,

If it’s not what you would choose?

Would you want to know the future,

If it ends badly for those you love?

Would you want to know the future

If it’s a vulture, not a dove?

But what if the future’s not totally fixed

And there’s still time for a change?

What if it’s not all written in stone,

And hope’s not out of range?

What if God only gives us glimpses

Of what will someday be,

But he let’s us fill in the blanks

Between here and eternity?

What if we have a role to play

In the grander scheme of things,

What if we have at least some say,

In who will wear the rings?

What if God only reveals

Enough of the future today

To give us hope and encouragement

But not remove the need to pray?

What if we see through a glass darkly,

And most of the objects aren’t clear,

Things look closer in the mirror,

Than they actually are from here?

Pundits and prognosticators

The weather men of time,

Are often over-confident

Ridiculous, not sublime.

Take predicting the return of Jesus,

Many have boldly bet,

They all have one thing in common,

They’ve never been right—yet.

When you have that sort of failure rate

Reticence is required

Lest you be dubbed false prophet,

Your predictor’s license expired.

The prophecies raises expectations

That God will see things through

They don’t encourage calculations,

Which tell God when he’s due.

Prophecy is not about calculation

Nor prognostication at all

Those are human preoccupations

Not part of the Almighty’s call

Prophecy is about God’s promise

That all will be well one day,

It does not tell us when or where

It’s not for us to say.

Prophecy paints the big picture,

Of justice and mercy at last,

It does not give us the co-ordinates

It does not say how fast.

There’s a reason for this reticence

God’s in control of time

He has not handed us the helm,

Only He knows the reason and rhyme.

Only he knows what is best for all of us,

Only he knows when to bring it to pass

Only he knows where it’s all going,

And how long it ought to last.

God will never make our lives

So we don’t need to trust

He will never make his creatures

So that prayer is not a must.

We will always be his creatures

Who must rely on his loving care

I am sure he is tired of our asking

“Aren’t we already almost there?”

When faith finally becomes sight,

And hopes are realized,

When the eschatological dust clears

And we see with new creation eyes

There will be one thing left standing

That we’ve been trusting all along,

A loving God’s desire and ability

To finish his own love song.

The reason love is yet greater

Than faith or even hope,

Is because it endures forever

And enables us to cope.

Climb down from your own seer’s tower

Place your life in the Father’s hands,

For he always knows what’s best for us,

And he gives what he commands.

Stop writing fear-based fiction

It needs to be left behind

It dishonors our loving Maker

Abandons the faith-based design.

Someday we will see our Savior

Someday we will know, as we’re known,

In the meantime stop playing God,

And leave the future alone.

When Christ returns let him find you,

Doing what he made us for,

Loving people into the kingdom,

Feeding and clothing the poor.

Inasmuch as you’ve done it unto the least of these,

You’ve done it unto the Lord,

Let him find you imitating his actions,

Not frightening the faithful but bored.

Let him who runs read the writing

That’s written on the wall,

‘Take up y
our cross and follow me,

Sacrifice and serve them all’.

‘Parting is all we know of heaven,

And all we need of hell’*,

Those who simply trust the Lord,

Will find that they’ve done well.

July 20 2007

BW3

* E. Dickinson– Poem 96, “My Life Closed Twice…”