August 15th

"Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, 'What do you want?' or, 'Why are you speaking with her?'" John 4:27

they finally seemed to catch on,
even foot-in-the-mouth Pete

and the jockeying-for-power

boys of old Zebedee, as they

just stood there and watched

while Jesus did his thing and

turned the world of this outsider,

as well as his insider buds upside down.

but then, 

we came along, with our list

of guidelines and polity books,

our requirements on being able

to get a ticket in line to even

try to get close to Jesus, 

our never-ending squabbles over

the best way to water a newbie

and the oh-so-proper approach

to sanitizing that final party they had.

and the wheels on 

the Good News bus came off

and it has been sitting 

by side of the road

ever since, waiting for us to let

Jesus get back in the driver's seat.

(c) 2024 Thom M. Shuman

Venmo: @Thom-Shuman