You can talk about love all day long,
And how God is love
And how yours is a loving church
And how love is the most important thing,
But if your love isn’t
The same kind of love as God’s,
It’s all a racket
And a scam
And a fraud
And you’re playing only
To those like yourself
Who are too dull
To want the real thing.
God is the most misunderstood person ever,
And so is his love.
It is both kind and stern
Forgiving and demanding
Giving and requiring
Which is a fact most are
Unwilling to accept
To the full extent of its trueness,
And will deliberately ignore
Even to their own peril.
Though a few seem to prefer the reverse,
Most will want God to be
All acceptance and no accountability
All forgiveness and no training
All promise and no consequence
All giving and no taking
All cookies and no spanking
All blessing and no curse―
Nothing to fear
Nothing to dread
Nothing to make one watch his step.
And they can have it their way, I suppose,
Right up until they die and visit God’s house,
Where he proves both their racket and his sternness.
And then they will see how it really is,
And will regret all that boasting they had done
About that particular brand of “love”
They practiced and promoted
While they were here.
And God will decide what to do about it.
