Christ our Passover: the lasting sacrifice

Christ our Lasting Sacrifice
by Mary Harwell Sayler

I have come to do Your Will, O God
for the blood of animals cannot take away
sin forever.
Short-lived sacrifices, short-term offerings
do not cover sin forever,
and so You have prepared for Me
a Body
ready to be sacrificed –
the First to Last –
ready to do Your Will.

I have come to do Your Will, O God
as Holy Scriptures said I would
for You can no longer tolerate
temporary fixes:
interim sacrifices, itinerant offerings, burnt
offerings, sin offerings once accorded by Law.

You Will, O God, I have come to do to
fulfill the first way and establish the second
to sanctify All by offering
Myself –
the Body of Christ
arising – First and Last –
to do Your Will, O God.
I have come to do Your Will.



© Mary Harwell Sayler, all rights reserved; prayer-a-phrase poem from today’s Bible reading in Hebrews 10:4-10

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Singing a Psalm on Easter week

Thank You, God!

Give thanks to the LORD
and call on God’s Name.
Tell about God’s work
for all people!

Sing to the LORD!
Sing praises to our God.
Tell of God’s wonderful works.

Let your glory be in the Holy Name.
Let your heart in the LORD rejoice.

Seek the LORD and find strength.
Let the LORD look at you
as you look at the LORD.

Oh, remember!
Remember all God has done.
Remember the wonders God created.
Remember and recall what
the Word of God says.

Oh, children of God,
you are chosen!
The LORD our God chooses you!

The LORD our God wants
what’s right for you
and all the world,
for God – our God remembers
the promises made to you
and to the people of God yet to come.

© 2013, Mary Harwell Sayler, prayer-a-phrased from today’s Bible reading in Psalm 105:1-8

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He is Risen!

After the Resurrection, Christ appeared to many people throughout Jerusalem and Galilee, and even then some did not believe, but Thomas did. Only a few days beforehand, the apostle had been willing to die for Christ, but he doubted the Resurrection until he saw for himself the wounds in Jesus’ hands and side. The Believing Thomas then exclaimed and proclaimed, “My Lord and my God!”

Thomas
by Mary Harwell Sayler

Why did you doubt
the real live blood that sprouted
from Christ's side and bloomed
in the room where you gathered –

a bouquet of wine
poured behind
closed doors?

Could you not see the pores
opened, aching for you, always
to be, not beside yourself,
but Him?

His side lay bare to let you in,
so enter now. Come round His side
and worship Him again.


© 2013 Mary Sayler, all rights reserved. “Thomas” originally saw print in a 1998 issue of Central FL Episcopalian.

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Christ on Holy Saturday

Re: Deemed
by Mary Harwell Sayler

Consider the lily
of the moon.

Consider how
its spinning
does not toil.

Consider the lily-
shaped flames of hell
where the wretched
walk through water
on Christ’s back:

His face a lily
white with flame,

His tongue an
inferno for our
wrong words,

His eyes alight
with our cured souls,

His Body
our kind Host
of comfort.


© 2013, Mary Sayler, all rights reserved. “Re:Deemed” appeared on the Catholic Exchange website in 2007 and is included in the Kindle e-book, a Christian Poet’s Guide to Writing Poetry, available from Amazon.

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God’s promise from the prophet Isaiah

Promising Good Friday

Who believes what we have heard?
To whom has the strength of the LORD been revealed?
For the One we awaited grew up
like a shoot from a dry root in the ground.

He had no majestic form to look upon –
nothing in His appearance to cause desire.
Instead, He was despised and rejected –
suffering such grief, we wanted to hide our faces
from facing so much sorrow.

We saw no explanation for Him,
and so we despised Him,
even though He took on our infirmities,
even though He took on our dis-ease,
even though we thought Him struck down
by God.

But He was wounded for our transgressions
and crushed for our iniquities.
Upon Him came the full punishment
to make us whole, and by the stripes
borne on His back, we all are healed.

Like sheep, we all have gone astray.
We have all turned to our own way,
and, as the LORD laid on Him
the iniquity of us all, He had to pay
for us,
for our ancestors,
and for our children’s crimes.

When accused of our wrongdoings,
He did not even open His mouth
but went silently like a sheep before its shearers,
like a Lamb led to its slaughter,
like a perversion of justice taken wordlessly away.

Who could imagine He had any future?
For He was cut from the land of the living
and stricken for our transgressions.

Someone carved His grave among the tombs
owned by the wicked and the rich,
even though He had done no violence,
nor even had a deceitful word
to say. But, by the will of the LORD,
pain crushed His life into an offering –

the final sacrifice we had to bring
to God for sin – for us,
for our ancestors, for our children – all,
His spiritual offspring.

© 2013, Mary Harwell Sayler, prayer-a-phrase poem of today’s Bible reading in Isaiah 53:1-10

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Passover: The First, The Last

Promise of Passover

The blood of a lamb on the doorpost,
the blood of an unblemished lamb
on your doorpost,
the blood that drips from the crossbeams
is the sign on the house where you live –

the sign for death to pass over,
the sign for a day of remembrance,
the sign of the death of the firstborn –
of the Lamb who gave blood for your doorpost.


© 2013 Mary Harwell Sayler, poem prayer-a-phrased from today’s reading in Exodus 12

Bible prayer-a-phase of Isaiah 49

Staying Light in the LORD
by Mary Sayler

Before I was born, the LORD called me.
In the womb, God named me and made
my mouth a sword
hid in the hull of His hand –
a smooth arrow
quivering in Him.

And the LORD said to me, “Ah! You are
My servant who shines in Me,”
but I said, “No! I have served in vain.
I’ve spent my strength
for nothing but my own name,
while thinking myself pure, thinking
my cause was God-caused.

But the LORD, Who formed me to be
His servant as one who brings His own
back to Him in His own strength, not mine,
said, “It is too light a thing to raise and restore
My people who are My people, and so
I will give you as a light to the nations.
I will give you to the nations as a light,
and to the ends of the earth, this light,
lit only by Me, will shine My salvation
into the deepest dark corners of the earth,
lightening and lifting every unfinished end.”

© 2013, Mary Harwell Sayler, prayer-a-phrased poem evoked by today’s Daily Bible Reading in Isaiah 49

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Name change and changing plans

One of my favorite quotes comes from the movie Sabrina where the title character says, “Sometimes more isn’t better. Sometimes it’s just more,” to which I add, “Amen!” But I still wound up with 7 blogs and 2 websites so also add, “Oops.”

Too many good ideas, good activities, and even good ministries can be too much of a good thing.

Therefore, I recently let one website go but couldn’t get a handle on how to regroup the blogs. Since I believe in the importance of each one, I’ve been praying about this longer than Lent. But finally, clarity came the first day of Holy Week.

Having written about writing for many years, I have numerous articles to draw from that could be helpful, I hope, for members of the Christian Poets and Writers group on Facebook. Many of those articles, which will gradually appear in the Christian Poets and Writers blog, have previously appeared here, but In a Christian Writer’s Life is no longer my primary focus for newly written articles. The Bible is.

If you have visited my blogs on Bible People, Bible Prayers, Christian Healing Arts, and What the Bible Says About Love, I pray you’ll follow the newly revised blog here, where, Lord willing, new posts will most likely arise in prayer-a-phrases from Daily Bible Readings.

In addition some of my poems previously published in books or secular journals will soon be on the Poetry Editor blog, Lord willing, which means that the only blog of mine that may stay as is for now are reviews of new translations, study editions, and children’s Bibles on the Bible Reviewer blog.

With two new reviews still waiting to be winged, others may depend on whether Bible publishers add me to their list of reviewers. And, oh, I pray they do because when it comes to the Bible less just doesn’t work for me! Sometimes more is better.

© 2013, Mary Harwell Sayler

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Tips for a long writing life

Writing for traditional book companies, magazines, or other print publications may take a little time to investigate, think about, and prayerfully consider, but you gain a lot for the effort. Besides acquiring publishing credits with well-known publishers, you will most likely receive editorial feedback and immediately gain a wide readership for your work.

If that greater outreach appeals to you, you’ll be glad to know that many articles relating to your writing interests have already been posted on this blog. Lord willing, the following tips will also help you to build and sustain a long career in freelance writing:

Read and study well-written classics and contemporary works in your genre.

Think about what first drew you to each book, poem, article, or story and what retains your interest.

Re-read periodicals you like and get familiar with everything from the Table of Contents to Letters to the Editor.

Also notice ads to see what readers of a particular publication are drawn to and what interests them. If those same things interest you – and if the poems, articles, or stories do too – then add that publication to your list of Most Likely Markets.

Make a list, too, of your God-given gifts, special interests, experiences, and topics that come to mind as you read, considering and noting any gaps your work might fill.

Ask God to guide you in using your gifts and selecting a topic.

Find a relevant theme, focus, or goal for that particular topic and reading audience, again, praying for God’s guidance.

Research your subject well, creating a bibliography as you go.

As you begin to write, let your writing flow without hindering or criticizing yourself. Then let your work rest. Later, read each page as if someone else had written it.

Read aloud each revision, listening especially for unclear wording or discordant sounds.

Revise accordingly then place your best manuscript with an editor – one editor at a time.

Follow the writers’ guidelines carefully for each submission. (You can usually find these on the company’s website.)

Keep track of where, when, and to whom you mailed your work.

While you wait to hear from one editor, query another about your next idea.

Begin at the beginning of these suggestions.

Begin and end with prayer for God’s ongoing guidance, inspired ideas, and a long, blessed writing life!

© 2013, Mary Harwell Sayler, all rights reserved.

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Sending your poems and manuscripts to traditional publishers

Poets and writers often self-publish their work because they do not know how to go about getting published by traditional print journals, books, or e-zines. These tips, first posted here over 3 years ago, bear tweaking and repeating:

• Notice publishers of books and periodicals you like to read.

• Most of these publishers now have a website where you can study the titles in their book lines and read the poems and articles in their archives.

• Make a list of each publisher whose work is similar to yours.

• Study the writers' guidelines on each company's website.

• Some editors want a query first to get a quick idea of what you have in mind. Consider this a “sales pitch” meant to give the editor an overview that’s brief, relevant, and to the point.

• If an editor prefers your actual manuscript or batch of poems, great! Just follow the writers’ guidelines, submitting to one editor at a time.

• Keep track of where and when you sent your work. If you do not have a response in 2 to 3 months, follow-up.

• While you wait to hear about one poem or manuscript submission, start another.

• If the editor returns your work, don’t take it personally. The acceptance pile might be too big and space too small. But just in case, your work still needs work: Read it aloud. Listen for rough spots. Revise as needed, then submit the manuscript to the next publisher on your list.

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© 2013, Mary Harwell Sayler, all rights reserved. To give you an idea of the traditional publishing experiences that went into these suggestions, visit my Bio on my website.

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Praying Bible prayers

Bible Prayers: Praying for the glory of God

One of the most important aspects of a Christian writer's life is prayer, and I don't know about you, but sometimes I get tired of mine! Too many projects can overwhelm, and so can too few, but either starts an erosion process similar, I suppose, to ditch-digging, and I get in a rut.

For years I've turned to the Bible to enlarge my prayer life, and, well, get over myself. So, eventually, I researched everything the Bible presented on prayer and even had a book in mind to bring readers the scriptural references to Almost All the Prayers in the Bible. And then I discovered that Dr. Herbert Lockyer had been there and done that many decades ago in his "all" series, which, reportedly, brought Zondervan into the publishing business and off to a blessed start but didn't help my writing plans!

I tried revising the idea into a series of devotionals, which could work I guess, but I felt as though I were only repeating and, perhaps, updating Dr. Lockyer's work. So I gave up my idea.

And then the idea came.

With the Revised Lectionary getting Christians of all denominations to be, literally, on the same page, those daily Bible readings provided the source and impetus for praying Bible prayers that arise in the readings each week. Since I did not want to choose from the many fine translations available or bother with permission for usage of Holy Scripture, I began the habit of cutting/ pasting prayer-filled readings into my file (hmm, word scramble for life), looking up the passages in almost every English translation available, and then paraphrasing the prayers.

Often those prayer-a-phrases (as I've begun to call them) will come with a touch of poetry, which, come to find out, is the way about half of Holy Scripture originally came to the writers of the Bible – poetically! So all I can add is:

Glory be to God for potent prayers and poetry!

Glory be to God for the Bible’s timeless word to us as we look forward and toward the Word of The LORD, alive in our lives – and praying in, on, through, and all around us in Bible prayers.


© 2012 Mary Harwell Sayler, all rights reserved, but pass it on!

P.S. Eight years after writing the above, I had the joy of announcing the Book of Bible Prayers on Amazon!


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Deep See: Fishing for People

Fishing for fish requires some type of equipment, and fishing for people even more so. Either way Fisherfolk need a “hook.”

To catch your readers' attention:

Ask a pertinent question. Possibilities vary, depending on the audience, topic, and need, but for starters, consider the worries, complaints, and unpleasant subjects that often worm their way into a conversation. Then go from there.

For instance, how do we deal with greed? grief? grievances? guilt? gullibility? – our own or someone else’s. Such questions can hook readers quickly, but it takes research and credibility to reel them in (or rock the boat!)

Make a startling statement. Jesus did this when trying to get through to the Pharisees, who could see but not deeply. For example, “It’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a person who has everything to enter the Kingdom of God,” Mark 10:25.

Consider the lily pads in your fishing spot. Go below the flowers and the surface to anchor deep. For example, Jesus’ wise words “Consider the lilies” might bring to mind the poetic adage “Gather ye rose buds while ye may” or “Stop and smell the roses,” which overworked pastors might need to hear.

Similarly a field of lilies blooming profusely might remind readers that God does indeed provide without expecting them to work themselves into a worried frazzle. If you look closely at the shape or structure of an individual lily, you might also notice the quiet beauty of their trumpets and what that suggests for readers open to your deep see.

Get wise. Get a Bible. Almost any Bible that speaks your language will do in helping you to find a fitting voice for the godly wisdom that draws people to Christ.

This is not the same as saying whatever floats up or sounds deep when expressing shallow opinions. Even if such sayings have some basis in wisdom and truth, the deeper wisdom and truth of biblical saying add impact and depth.

Say, for example, I tell you in my most convincing voice, “God will celebrate and sing because of you!” Even with good timing for such a statement, your response might be, “Oh, yeah?” But don’t those same words have a more powerful impact if you know Zephaniah 3:17 said them first?

© 2012, Mary Harwell Sayler, all rights reserved, but pass it on – especially that quote from Zeph. Don’t you just love it! Here’s the whole verse in other English voices:

“The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing,”
Zephaniah 3:17, KJV (King James Version.)

“Hashem thy G-d in the midst of thee is gibbor; He will save, He will rejoice over thee with simchah; He will quiet [you] in His ahavah (love), He will joy over thee with singing,”
Zephaniah 3:17, Orthodox Jewish Bible.

“ADONAI your God is right there with you,
as a mighty savior.
He will rejoice over you and be glad,
he will be silent in his love,
he will shout over you with joy,”
Zephaniah 3:17, Complete Jewish Bible.

“The LORD your God
wins victory after victory
and is always with you.
He celebrates and sings
because of you,
and he will refresh your life
with his love,”
Zephaniah 3:17, Contemporary English Version.

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(c) 2012, Mary Harwell Sayler.