Afrikaans Poetry: Sterfbed

Sterfbed

Ons het rondom jou bed gestaan.

Die bloeiende pyp in jou neus

het die waarheid weggegee,

hoewel ons almal dit geweet het.

Ook jy het dit geweet en daarom
was ons jou genooide gaste
om met nat wange vir oulaas te kom groet.

Maar eers moes ons brood breek.

‘n Druppel, ‘n krummel,‘n gebed
is al wat jy kon inneem.

En toe jy jou oë sluit,

was dit nie om te sterf nie.

In hortende, stotende sinsnedes

wat God afpleit op vrou en kind,

en eer gee vir geleende tyd,

het jy Jesus voor my oopgebreek.

Afrikaans Poetry: Lamentasie

Lamentasie

En dan is daar dae wat mens
desperaat wag
vir 'n silwer sonskynrant
op die horison
van 'n donker wolkbank.

Is Jesus God?

This following article is written by Scot McKnight and can also be read HERE.

Anyone who has examined the Gospels searching for how Jesus understood himself or for clues that he thought he was God, as we affirm in our creeds and is standard belief, knows that the Gospel texts are not as cooperative as we sometimes think. But there are clues that must be considered, especially the old line that anyone who thought of themselves as Jesus did is either off the map or genuinely did see himself in extraordinary, divine terms.

But this whole theme has been served a very significant treatment now in the published dissertation of Sigurd Grindheim, and I’m encouraging anyone who can do such a thing to write to their library (theological) and urge the immediate purchase of this new outstanding book: God’s Equal: What Can We Know About Jesus’ Self-Understanding? (Library Of New Testament Studies). Yes, it’s expensive; yes, libraries are the place for such a book.

I hope eventually a more affordable version of this excellent piece will be available. Here’s what Grindheim does:

His contention is that Jesus made himself “God’s equal.”

He examines God’s kingdom, the miracles of Jesus, Jesus and forgiveness, Jesus as eschatological judge, Jesus and the law, Jesus’ relationship to his followers, Jesus’ metaphorical self-descriptions, mediatory figures in Second Temple Judaism, Jesus as unique Son who is both subordinate and equal, Jesus as Son of Man and Jesus as new temple.

“The Jesus who emerges then is a Jesus who said and did only what God could say and do.”

Afrikaans Poetry: Iemand soos jy

Iemand soos jy

Iemand soos jy het in my lewe ingewarrel.

Dit was goed toe dit goed gegaan het.

Dit was onhoudbaar in die orkaan

wat met die haas in die pad begin het.

Iemand soos jy het my lewe omgewarrel.

Die stofwolke het nooit gaan lê nie;

‘n tiental nagte het jaar-in en jaar-uit

soos ‘n donderslag tussen ons bly lê.

En toe het jy weer weggewarrel.

Jy wou nie geklem wees aan die windstiltes

van ‘n voorstedelike lewe nie.

Jy kon nie meer jou liefde met my deel nie.

Iemand soos jy het my lewe stukkend gewaai.

Die haelskade sit nog steeds in my siel vas

en elke donderslag krap die seer van voor af oop.

Al gaan die lewe aan.