How is it within you, O God,
to imagine land flowing with
milk and honey, bright rivers
spilling over with satisfying life
to make harvests abundant
and people glad to no longer
know thirst? How is it, O God,
that your holy imagination and
your living heart can conceive
of a someday without hunger,
without tears, without people
lost and walking alone; of a
by-and-by in which nations
no longer war, when violence
is the stuff of fiction and hate
fades like a nightmare at dawn?
How is it, dear God Most High,
that you can conceive of hills
rising up in standing ovations,
mountains shaking their stodgy
shoulders with deep laughter,
trees picking up their rooted
skirts to join the eternal dance?
But most of all, O God of all
creation, O Christ who lived
among us, blessed Spirit who
burns within us, how is it at all
possible that you believe we
are capable of participating in
imagination and grace with you?

on Isaiah 55:1