Beauty in Wartime

“Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.”Thanks for reading crumbs from His table fellowship! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Philippians 4:8 NASB1995To what end shall I celebrate beautyWhen every morning brings talesOf wars and rumors of wars,Storms, wrecks, cancers, sudden deaths, upheavals—When “things fall apart;The centre cannot hold”?Is beauty thenNot frivolous, unserious,Prodigal?Beauty persists in witnessTo the reign of my beautiful God.This groaning, tattered, blood-stained world,Tainted in all its parts and propertiesBy sin and death,Still bears fingerprints of Glory,A hint of foretaste of new creation coming,A faded echo of the “It is good”Before the “Cursed is the groundBecause of you.”Beauty persists in resistance,Not ignorance or denial, butA lamp lit to defy the dark,A cellist in Sarajevo’s rubble,A nightingale in a white night,A monarch for a memorial day,A refugee danseur pouring pain into pirouettes.Beauty persists like Frodo’s star-glass,A light when all other lights go out,A weapon in the fight for joy,A wordless declaration that sorrow and sufferingAre not the final word,That serpent’s venom spent itselfOn Savior’s heel—Our adversary’s head now crushed—Resurrection coming,Unmaking soon to be remade.Beauty persistsBecause God made His poemsPoets—Creations in Creator’s image,We cannot but create—Whether weapons of warfareAnd engines of destruction,Or pain composted into fruitful flourishing,And heartache mended with golden hope,Help, sustenance, and comfortIn the conquering Lion-Lamb,Faithful and True.Beauty persists,A foretaste of good promisesOn their way to usAnd a testament of faithThat they are true.It tastes and sees and saysThat the Lord, He is good.Beauty leans forward in hopeful expectationOf God’s faithfulness and steadfast love.He who is comingWill come and not delay!I celebrate beautyWhen every morning seems to bring fresh misery,Because every morning brings fresh merciesAnd unfailing love.Joy persists in flashes of morning sunOn intricately woven web dazzling with dew.Spring persists in comingIn the cruelest month;Blooms burst forth from winter’s graveAnd the time of the singing of birds will come.When things fall apart,God’s centrality yet holds.His prodigality of beauty,Lifting my eyes to the unseen, eternal things,Compels me, too,To the serious celebration of beauty.The sculptures depicted are the some of the work of Seward Johnson which were exhibited at the Dallas Arboretum for Dallas Blooms 2025. Thanks for reading crumbs from His table fellowship! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit crumbsfromhistable.substack.com