Set your mind on the Spirit

Haiku responding to Rom. 8:6-11

Looking to ourselves

leads to death; to find life, peace,

look to the Spirit.

Minds set on the flesh

are hostile to God; God's law

does not rule in them.

You are not fleshly

since God's Spirit dwells in you.

You belong to Christ.

Christ dwells in you; though

the body, through sin, is dead,

the Spirit is life!

God's Spirit, who raised

Jesus to life, gives us life;

makes God's home in us.

© Ken Rookes 2026

We work as one

Haiku of the common purpose

Spiritual babes;

that is how Paul described them.

A fractious people.

You are of the flesh,

not the Spirit, I fed you

milk, not solid food.

Quarrels, Jealousies;

these prove that you have not heard,

do not understand.

My job was to plant,

Apollos watered. We work

as one to serve God.

God alone gives growth,

Apollos, Paul don’t matter.

What matters is God

We work together,

servants of God for your sake.

Grow strong in God’s field!

© Ken Rookes 2023

The Word is one of us

Haiku of wonder

In the beginning.

Great opening to a book

exploring myst’ry.

How did it begin?

Big bang; the divine Logos,

sparking in the dark?

John writes of the Word;

one with God, present; cosmic

primogenitor.

Verses of wonder:

through him came life, bringing light

for all humankind.

The defiant light

shines through the gloom. The darkness

cannot put it out.

Throughout history

the Word comes, speaking God’s life.

Not many listen.

More wonder! The Word

becomes human; one of us,

sharing in our life.

Grace and truth have come

to us in Jesus, God’s Son.

Jesus makes God known

© Ken Rookes 2021

Life for the whole world

 

Haiku for disputation

I am bread that lives

and gives life to the whole world;

life that comes from God.

He offends them, this

Johannine Jesus; speaking

of his flesh and blood.

Only Eucharist

can make sense of these sayings.

That, and his dying.

True food, and true drink,

my very self in flesh, blood;

I am here for you.

Eat of me; take me

deeply inside you, find me

in all your living

Take me deep within;

my body, blood, and my words.

You shall truly live.

You, who are my friends,

I live in you, you in me;

multiplying life.

© Ken Rookes 2021

The Word

 

Haiku of the Light.

In the beginning.

John carries us back in time:

God and the Big Bang.

Pushing back beyond

Miriam, Sarah and Eve

to Creation One.

An over-all plan

from the beginning of time:

hope for humankind.

He said, Let Light shine!

And life, light for all people

breaks through the darkness.

John came voicing hope,

to announce the one true light.

He was not the light.

The Light-Hope-Logos,

seed found at creation’s core,

becomes one of us.

Those who receive him,

who take his word deep within,

are made God’s children.

The law has limits.

Jesus brings grace, truth and love;

life comes from these things.

Many speak of God.

Only Jesus, called God’s Son,

truly makes God known.

© Ken Rookes 2020

He was in the world

Haiku of the Word

He was in the world;

he whose heartbeat resonates

with earth’s deep rhythms.

They did not know him;

his own people, not seeing

nor receiving him.

They are crying out,

yearning, aching. They will not

come, they will not hear.

He is in the world

at one with God, and with us;

listen to his words.

What will his words be?

Words that challenge and disturb,

turning upside down.

Some were listening,

taking his words deep within,

God’s faithful children.

And the Word became.

one of us, with flesh and blood,

with pain and dying.

Here, then, is wonder;

here is grace and here is truth,

for each one of us.

© Ken Rookes 2019

Becoming flesh

Haiku of wonder

In the beginning.

What a great opening line;

so much could follow.

Logos, more than word;

impossible mystery,

the essence of God.

There at creation,

alongside and one with God,

through whom all things come.

The six days give way

to the big bang universe;

was the Logos there?

Logos, source of life,

light challenging the darkness,

never submitting.

The true light arrives

to enlighten humankind;

may that day come soon!

Somehow mystery

takes flesh, coming among us;

living and dying.

Can you see where he

does touch earth with grace and hope;

will you receive him?

You who receive him

are his sisters and brothers;

children of God’s will.

© Ken Rookes 2019

The bread of life

Haiku for those who need to be fed

The Johanine Christ

calls himself the bread of life;

much consternation.

Is this not Jesus,

the son of the carpenter?

Claims to come from God!

The Father sent me,

and he draws many to me;

I will raise them up.

Learn from the Father

and come to me. I’ll show you

how to truly live.

Your ancestors ate

wilderness bread from above;

death still embraced them.

I am living bread.

Eat of me, receive my life;

you need never die.

Heaven’s living bread,

bread that gives life to the world:

this bread is my flesh.

© Ken Rookes 2018

He was in the beginning

Haiku of the coming

In the beginning.

They are indivisible,

the Logos and God.

Into the nothing

the Logos-God mystery

find their voice and speak.

The word, now spoken,

all creation comes to be.

Here is wonderment.

The Logos brings life;

life and light for humankind,

defeating darkness.

Logos, always there

in the world he created,

passes through, unseen.

Among his people

he finds no welcome nor home.

The loss is their own.

Yet some received him,

believed, and living by faith,

were made God's children.

To be born of God,

transcending earthly limits;

this, then, is glory.

The Logos took flesh,

our flesh, and lived among us;

full of grace and truth.

© Ken Rookes 2016

And the word became flesh and lived among us

The Logos-word came,

so the story goes,

sharing light and truth and wonder

with us earth-folk;

receiving, in return,

the planet's dust and strife,

along with our tears, regrets and weariness.

Hardly a balanced transaction.

© Ken Rookes 2015

Difficult Words Haiku

Eat my flesh, he says,

as if it’s a normal thing;

this deep mystery.

Living forever;

the reward for believers.

Is there something more?

The spirit makes life,

he told those who would listen.

The flesh, conversely.

His difficult words

drove many away. Not me;

there is no other.

The fisherman spoke

for us all. Your words are life:

where else can we go?

© Ken Rookes 2015

yeats poem

The three-fold terror of love: a fallen flare
Through the hollow of an ear;
Wings beating about the room
The terror of all terrors that I bore
The Heavens in my womb.
Had I not found content among the shows
Every common woman knows,
Chimney corner, garden walk,
Or rocky cistern where we tread the clothes
And gather all the talk?
What is this flesh I purchased with my pains,
This fallen star my milk sustains,
This love that makes my heart's blood stop
Or strikes a sudden chill into my bones
And bids my hair stand up?
-W.B. Yeats 1865-1939