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In the Beginning Was The Word
He mended nets, and men that have to mend,
With patience broken nets can not be rich;
His words may have seemed dull, irrelevant,
And he would surely never write nor teach.
Illiteracy is no asset to commend,
Besides tough is the life of fishermen,
Just fishing for a livelyhood and mend
Old broken nets to catch more fish again.
Who plies this trade, so simple tough and rough,
Has for more learning no contingency,
Concerned with only catching fish enough
To win the bread for a big family.
The Greeks had learned men wise, deft and bright,
Pytagoras and Socrates to boot,
But fishermen are not so erudite,
Besides from Galilee came nothing good.
"Naught good did ever come from Galilee,
From Betsaida nor from Nazareth."
Spoke many a savvy learned pharsee,
"These folks are stubborn and illiterate".
These folks can't read nor write, illiteracy
And poverty forbids them change carreer,
"Fish catch is all they think, - theology
Is so beyond their mind" the scribes would sneer.
But Jesus saw the brothers Zebedee,
Amending broken nets there by the sea,
Not ocean, but the lake of Galilee,
And looked at them and said" "Come follow me!".
They did and followed promptly our Lord,
And left their homes and family behind,
And nourished they were by His Word
Who took possession of their hearts annd mind.
From Holy Writ we know that John did rest
As "The Beloved" for his loyalty
At the Last Supper upon Jesus breast
And stood with Jesus' mother by the tree.
"Dear Son behold your mother, care for her !
And "Woman" - thus He spoke "behold your son"
I do commit you to each others care,
And mankind too, as if they were your own".
The fisherman did later on alight
At Ephesus - a pillar of the Lord,
And now the fisherman began to write
As none before of the Eternal Word.
And John surpassed philosophers and sage
That ever lived in every single line
With power from on high for every age
And great simplicity of things divine.
The writings of the wise seem poor and dim
Became irrelevant or are forgot,
And pale before John's writings dazzling gleam,
When the great visionary wrote of God
Straight forward, simple wrote the fisherman
Possessed by Spirit and with grace bestirred
A wisdom hid, denied to learned men
The words: "In the beginning was THE WORD".
(c) Elizabeth Dandy
