Weary, I returned to this house of bread
No longer hungry, but hollow,
Having traded sweetness for bitterness
And the fullness of love for emptiness.
Everything I planted had withered.
                              O come, O come, Emmanuel

But your mercy is determined,
Showing itself in stubborn loyalty and surprising obedience.
And with each kindness, every act of grace
Light seeped in like water,
filling the cracks and crevices of the soul
                             O come, Thou Dayspring, come

And I have seen, Lord, that you restore life to barren fields
and make streams in the heart of the desert
I took waiting for absence and did not understand
that sometimes, we do not reap what we sow. I planted my pain and anger,
but your showers of deliverance brought forth a harvest of joy.
                              O come, O Branch of Jesse’s stem

So the long line of your promise is kept.
Not an unbroken line, but broken and healed,
Full of outsiders and those who mourn,
Full of those who love and serve,
Even this small servant, from whom will come the greater.
                              O come, Thou Key of David, come

 

St. Peter's Fireside