“Just As I Am, without One Plea,” verse 4, ELW 592
4 Just as I am; thy love unknown has broken ev'ry barrier down; now to be thine, yea, thine alone,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.
Devotion
I am not much for poetry, but one poem I do especially enjoy is Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall.” Part of the poem reads, “Before I built a wall I'd ask to know/ What I was walling in or walling out/ And to whom I was like to give offence./ Something there is that doesn't love a wall.” What walls do we put up every day in our lives, and why do we build them? Are we afraid of what we are walling in? That if any come too close they might see that our lives are not as perfect as we try to project? Or are we afraid of what we are walling out? Is it the homeless person, the man or the woman struggling with addiction, the person battling disease, or the immigrant? Jesus comes just as we are, with love unknown that breaks every barrier down.
Prayer
Gracious God of love unknown, we ask you to break down the barriers and walls that we build in our lives every day. Remove our fears of what we wall in and what we wall out. Give to us your Spirit as we help others destroy the walls in their lives. In the name of the one who died so that we may be free, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.