Filling in the Blank

Theistic evolution,
that god plus evolution equals now
is your answer, and all that remains
is deciding who God is.  Yes,
and who are you and what is now
and where are we going from here?
I believe — do you want to know what I believe?
Not really, you say.  Clever little
conversation stopper, and yet
you have learned that you can
tell everyone what you believe
if only you do not lead with a question.
Believe it and impose it.
But I believe you are right.
(Now do you want to know?)
Blank plus evolution is, you say,
and we fill in the blank with
Buddha, Christ, Mohammed.
Or godlessness, emptiness, chance.
You get to choose what leads you to now:
the blank is true, and beyond this
we may never know the empirical truth
but we will rest in our faith.
But I believe — a statement, not a question,
that I cannot rest in godlessness,
that Genesis is true, setting us free,
that God is the beginning and the end,
the Big Bang and the final Word,
the constant Grace and the now,
Immanuel.  This is what I believe.

And you can call me, as you call yourself,
a theistic evolutionist with a neat little formula,
and you can rest in this, but now read on.
Read the poetry of John
and the songs of David,
the trial of Job and the angst of Qoheleth
Read the Gospels and Acts
and the letters to the early churches.
Read Revelation, and argue with it all,
question if you must, but register
all the incompetent hyper-human
history of one corner of the world,
the bumbling children of God,
trying to get to now,
trying to understand.

2

John wrote: this was Andrew’s random choice
for a moment of devotion, my sound request
in the midst of anger, vespers to escape
the disorderly storm...
and the soundless stream of consciousness
that flows into matins the morning after,
Where it is silent if not peaceful.  I write
as the children sleep.
I read: the Word, capital W.
I underline: the Word of life,
the Life made visible.
I know: we saw it, we share it
and now I write, small w,
that joy may be complete:
yours, ours,
we share this Life, capital L,
as we live in each other’s lives.

And now I am writing to you, son,
because your sins have been forgiven,
this is true, and I am writing to you, daughter,
because you have come to know the One,
the creator and the forgiver
who has existed since the beginning.
I am writing to you, children,
because you have defeated the darkness
and come to know the Father of all fathers
I am writing to you now
because you are strong
and filled with the Word
and continually filling in the blanks,
discovering the One
who has existed since the beginning,
sharing the One who forgives, the One
who first said, “Let there be Light.”

Beautiful choice, Andrew.
And Kirsten, beautiful premise.
There will be anger and insolence
and there will be times of silence too,
But you, each of you, are beautiful
and you complete the Joy, capital J,
that helps me fill in the blanks
Of my own life.