A braided cord
Three colors and a wrist
One young imagination
A little time
A timeless gift
She thought of no one
But my arm
Would wear the prize
For her hands had
Held the fabric
And the colors
Caught her eyes
Indifferent as she may be
To the one who wears the braid
Nothing but affection
Comes from the treasure
She has made
Its bothersome at times
But I adjust
And I reset
Any gift from this beauty
Is the most beautiful gift
I can get.
Bang, Bang the drum
Louder and louder
Overcome the other voices
The other thoughts
The other lives
Overcome the other
Bang, Bang the drum
Amplified and idolized
Is the message
Loud, even if not clear
Its something
Something to believe in?
No time for introspection
Humility or reception
Just another acoustic interjection
Into the clamor for
Noise upon noise
Bang, Bang the drum
Damn the rhythm or the beat
Don’t hear the marching feet
The voices in the street
No sweat, don’t feel the heat
Just Bang, bang the drum
Louder, faster, swept up in the drone
A hypnotic, disembodied tone
Banging, banging – All alone
Welcome to the arcade
We have games here for everyone
You’ll have some fun
Laugh, sweat, cuss, cheer
And all end up the same way
Out of money, out of time
Disappointed in the end – unsatisfied
Simulated life – in 30-60-90 seconds
Pretending to drive, but not driving
Pretending to fight, but not fighting
Pretending to win, but not winning
The arcade always wins
But you don’t seem to mind
Coins and tickets
Credits and crap
You go home with their slap bracelet
And stuffed animal
They go home with your twenty-dollar bill
If you’re lucky
We like to feel lucky
We like to know that luck is still a thing
That at any moment – something could happen
Something we didn’t earn or deserve
But for us and good nevertheless
We fear failure and dream of luck
We play seriously, as if it matters
And maybe it does
After all, isn’t that why you came?
Welcome to the arcade.
Ephesians 2:8-10
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— 9 not the result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.
“For we are what he has made us.”
Ephesians 2:8-9 is, with good reason, one of the central confessions of protestant evangelical Christianity – that our salvation in Christ Jesus is pure gift – pure grace – that we can’t earn it or work for it but receive it from our extraordinarily merciful and loving God. Not because of what we have done, but because of who God is and how God desires to envelop us fully into God’s communal love.
Verse 10 offers an interesting re-framing of works then. Too often we abstract verses 8 and 9 as a stand alone theological truth and in so doing jettison the place and purpose of “works” all together. We have indeed been created for good works. Verse 10 makes that clear. But how is it that we come about finding and doing this work? By discovering who he has made us to be. “For we are what he has made us.” At first pass, this statement seems to be tautological or circular at best. Of course we are what he has made us, who else could we be other than who we are. Until we remember that we were dead through the trespasses and sins 2 in which we once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient. Paul is saying that for too long we have been someone other than who God made us to be. We have followed a different course, pursued a different end, driven by a different desire, with a wholly different and distorted understanding of who we were.
To be made alive together with Christ is to discover – or rediscover – who God has made us to be. This is what it means to be saved. In discovering who this person is – what some theologians call this True Self – we at the same time discover what this person is created to do.
We are certainly not saved by our good works, but we are most certainly saved in order that we might get about the business of accomplishing our good works.