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POETRY

“The Trouble with Jesus,” read by Jessica Lynne Henkle.

The Trouble with Jesus

is, once you get to know Him,
your old lies don’t work so well
anymore. It’s the same thing as
saying your old life doesn’t work
so well anymore—the ways you once
dragged yourself along stutter and
stop, until you’re left by the roadside
with only dust in your hands.
“For dust thou art”—you’ve heard
it for twenty-five years, but only now
do you begin to understand. “Before
you know what kindness really is /
you must lose things,” writes Naomi
Shihab Nye. Maybe, before you know
who Jesus really is, you must lose
things, too—lose things with Him, for
it’s always with Him, even when it
feels like you lose things in spite
of Him, perhaps even because of Him,
like this salvation you signed up for,
with no way of knowing what you
were getting yourself into, has just
become sorrow visited upon sorrow,
punctured and pierced by joy upon
joy. “How shall this be?” Mary said
to the angel when he told her she
would bear the Savior. How shall
this be, thou favored one, who
knew all generations would call you
blessed, but whose soul was destined
to be pierced through with a sword?
So which is it, the blessing or the
sword? The joy or the sorrow?
The death or the birth? Yes. With
Jesus, it’s always yes, must always
be yes—the dust and the roadside,
the lost and the found, the truth
unfurling like a ribbon or a snake
down the road where Jesus walks,
His pierced hand held out to yours.

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Works Quoted:

• Genesis 3:19 (KJV)
• “Kindness” by Naomi Shihab Nye
• Luke 1:34 (KJV)

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Jessica Lynne Henkle has a BA in English and art history from Boston University and an MFA in writing from Pacific University. She runs, works, and prays in Portland, Oregon, where she’s always writing something. You can visit her at jessicalynnehenkle.com or follow her on Instagram @jessicalynnehenkle.

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Artwork: Christ Appearing to the Apostles after the Resurrection by William Blake. Public Domain.