There is a huge difference from one human to the next
Regarding how serious we are about sin.
And there is a huger difference still in this regard
Between the best of us and God.
And we are similarly varied―
Human to human and our best to God―
In our convictions regarding what is a suitable
Level of love and devotion from man to God.
And I do wonder whether, to God, both considerations
Are somehow the same thing.
Regardless, it seems to me we presume to be too familiar with God,
And make much too little of the divine pronouncement
That his ways and thoughts are higher than ours,
Assuming them just barely beyond our ready grasp,
If beyond it at all.
Yet for every one of us who errs on this side,
There is someone else erring on the other
In assuming none of it can be grasped,
And that it’s all a waste of time
Which serves as a convenient excuse
For their carelessness about the Creator.
But even though I care more than that,
Who but God is fit to judge whether
I will have cared enough to please him?
And so I must leave it to him,
Rather than to declare myself in advance
As having passed the test.
He will know just what to do with us all,
And will not err.
And even so, we have good reason to expect
The only a few will find that narrow gate
And walk that narrow road,
And endure and overcome to his satisfaction
Even though the most of us who act as if we care
Have long since decided that Heaven
Is a big-tent proposition that will surprise us
With how many have made it there,
Rather than with how few.
But I believe the most will be surprised
With how serious he was about sin all along,
And about the proper depth of love and commitment,
As about how little they had actually known God.
I get these ideas, of course, out of the Bible,
Which far too many of us assume is
Just barely beyond our ready grasp,
If it is beyond it at all―
Such that there’s really not much reason
To read for comprehension,
As if there were anything in there
That we don’t already know, more or less.
