Scarlet Robe Creations

I am Levi, I have taken advantage of my downtrodden brethren.  I am Mary, I anointed Your feet and wiped them with my hair. I am the rich man, Finding it so hard to forsake my comfort and wealth   and the poor, Encouraged that You take note of me.   I am he who cries out in the dark valley, I am the single lost sheep You search for   and she who they wish to stone, Trapped in the fornication this world worships.   I will deny In my fear of criticism. and I will betray, Since in my mind my plan is foremost to God's  I will stumble and rise again, Because of Your unconditional love. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

You are light where there is darkness. You are hope where there is despair. You are the word in the deepest silence. You are bread where there is hunger. You are water where there is thirst. You are healing where there is sickness. You are truth where there is doubt. You are love where there is emptiness. You are compassion where there is no mercy. And You are my God where there is no other. copyright 2017 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

A Moment of grace, my grandchild snuggling up against my shoulder, two weeks old, seeking security in a world new to his senses. My mind is separated from every conversation in the room, the chatter of life that will move on tomorrow and the day after. My thoughts, focusing on his breath against my neck. For this moment and the moments that follow, I am a grandfather... and little else matters... when we allow the Lord's grace to enfold us. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr 

We spend the day waiting, anxious thoughts, imagery in our hearts, a joy we wait without patience to embrace. Healthy lungs, ten fingers and ten toes, God knows the petitions in our hearts. It is not as when we were mother and father, expectant adults, growing into our roles. Now there is another generation to bear that joy. But we are the elders who sit back and wait, pray, while our daughter breathes through contractions and her husband holds her hand. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr 

The message we have heard, a song sung to a child through love. Notes, filling us with melody, taking us into an emotional union with the heart of God. I will sing His song today and tomorrow. It's verses will be ever on my tongue. He calls out and I answer. I am here to offer praise, despite my bruises and scars, promising to change in lieu of my failures. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

So he was the talk of the dusty streets.  Many had come to listen to this man of little education, a carpenter by trade.  I have to admit though, the things he has said must have come from God.  His words do not ridicule or chastise, as most of our laws.  His words are compassionate and the people, we take upon ourselves to lead spiritually, flock to him. I saw him out in the fields, a few days ago, this man who does not dress like any of the temple leaders.  He holds himself with authority, wearing garments of the poor.  His followers claim he is more than just a man.  They say they have witnessed miracles.  Demons have been ripped free from tormented souls.  A paralytic has been raised to his feet and given the power to walk and dance. I realize these claims may be exaggerations.  Still, I find myself, as do the others of my sect, drawn into the crowd with a desire to listen to his voice. So when master Simon extended the in...

Originally Submitted to https://christianwriters.com/ You are the audience which pays me for tricks. Have you not heard of my reputation? I can perform whatever it is that you ask. But I prefer that you listen to what I say and pay little attention to what I do. My words, print on paper mean so much more than the blind gaining sight. You seek physical manifestations while I wait for your spiritual acceptance. There is no miracle greater than my thoughts. So don't expect me to stand on a stage and make the paralytic walk. Don't expect me to come down from my cross with my wounds healed. It is not your body that I come seeking to embrace, but your heart. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

Anton Raphael Mengs - St. John the Baptist Preaching in the Wilderness The wilderness embraces me. Sand and rocks surround my feet. The heat bakes my flesh. It is here, I stand in communion with Yahweh .   I have sought solitude for my entire life,  casting off the temple duties of my father  to become a nomad.   I feast daily on locusts  and the wild fluids of nature.   I hear the creator's voice  and I know He hears me. The Lord tells me  it is time to come out from the dessert.   He,  who I have waited for  since the days in my mother's womb,  is ready to claim the course of his life.   I must make straight  the path he is to follow and beckon the repentant to the Jordan's shore. I must journey from the solitude of the wilderness to the persecution of the world. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author...

Turn towards me, I am constant. My gaze is always upon you. Step out of the shadows and into the light of my being, come home to me. I am waiting. Sometimes you choose to leave me in the background, thinking you will face me when the time is of your own choosing. I beckon you now and leave you with a choice. I will not force you to love me, although I adore you. If turning in my direction causes you to face the harshness of your life, I will be there at your side. I am always the father on the crest of the hill waiting for his son to return. So please turn back, knowing in your heart that I have never turned away. Give me the fabric of your withered heart and allow me to turn it into flesh. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

"Woe unto You, Scribes and Pharisees" Blind guides standing the shadows of hypocrisy. Loading heavy burdens on the shoulders of my children, causing them to stumble beneath the weight of your own ordained crosses, not mine. Stand up from your seats of judgement. You are less than those subjected to your misinterpreted laws. You have no right to condemn, or forgive. You are the false prophets, spoken of when the truth was first known. Blind guides, the veil was torn long ago, when the sacrificial lamb bled. The spirit was set free, over all the land and sea, with tongues of flame. Did you not receive humility in those days? I come to carry my children broken by pious hypocrites. The little ones who gathered at my feet, cast off by those who appointed themselves as holy. Be not blind to your own perceived virtue. Compassion is what I require of you. A warm heart, stepping into the light and gently leading the flock from darkne...

Often I pray for things I don't require, trinkets in life You know I don't really need. I am Your child, we are Your children, believing we need the glitter of this world. We belong to You Lord, nourish us as You would the sparrow, dress us like the lilies of the field. Walk among us, guide us down the road You desire most for our travel. We are Yours, we belong to You. I hope my prayer is not childish, that it is found important to You. I know You hear my every cadence and promise to give me only good things. Still, I know I am a child and my voice needs to be uttered with simplicity and humility. You know the deepest prayer in my heart today.  You know my unspoken sonnet for tomorrow. And You answer always, because we belong to You. I am Yours. My wife and family are Yours. Wrap us in Your embrace and secure us from all that binds our minds to worry. Often I pray for those closest to me, the gifts You have loaned to me. Caress their wounds when the world put...

In the Church, His spirit dwells not in the stone, wood, or stained glass. He is not an icon in the temple kept behind the veil. He is not controlled by our boundaries or doctrine, despite the parables we preach. He is in the parking lot of the supermarket, the main street of a borough, the sidewalk of a slum, waiting to be encountered. He is untethered from our expectations. He is more than our simplistic views can comprehend. In the true church, wherever His people gather. In flowering meadows, cragged mountain tops, or littered back alleys, He is present. The air does breathe His name and the songs, no matter how imperfect, move the heart of the almighty. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr  https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

A chorus of Barn Swallows greets the new morning. A simple song of praise, reminding me that the birds of the air do not sow or reap, Yet You care for all their needs. Help me Lord to take today for what it is, without worry about those things I cannot change. Help me to focus on Your truth and not the fables of the world. Lord, give me a voice today to sing praises for what You have offered and not what the world has tempted me to want. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

Under a canopy of leaves, am I out of Your sight? My thoughts seek a hiding place in shadows. I am the product of my failures, looking away from Your face, because I am less than You have made me to be. Shade along the byway hides me from the rays of warmth. I feel cold into my marrow. How can You know me and still wait patiently for me to turn around, step into the light? Under a canopy of leaves, I fight the need to step into the open. I know You see the core of my sacrilege, the sin I won't admit. Still You wait to embrace me and kill the fattened calf. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr  https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

Calm is the night when I can rest after my toil, knowing I have felt the Lord's presence in the day's effort. Restful peace encircles me, a prayer, a passage, scripture, all spoken to touch my heart with compassion. My thoughts, less chaotic, centered on truth and not the claimed ideologies of the humanistic world. Calm is the night when I have focused often on His word and left my guilt in healing hands. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

Will you open the door when the knocking disturbs your routine? I'm not selling religion, politics or encyclopedias. You think I am the outcast, the hungry, the thirsty, the one without shelter. So you sit back in your chair, bring your book of romance into view and live a fantasy. I will not cease to knock, an annoyance in your life, hoping soon you will realize I have so much more to offer than what you choose to receive. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr.

Who views our anguished soul when we lie cowering in shadows of despair? When we cannot stand before the reflection of what we are, or who we've become.   Who views our anguished soul when we feel unworthy to pray? When we feel that life has taken the best we had to give and left us abused in its wake.   Who views our anguished soul from the wooden scaffolding of any other creed? Who stretched out His arms to embrace all our sins? Who allowed His hands to be nailed in place so that we might be saved? copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

Gather in His name In places of low esteem and high. He hears your song as clearly on street corners as on mountain tops. Gather in temples or in barns set in open fields. Come rich come poor. Come saint and sinner. All will find a seat at His table. All are called to gather. To come together embracing our unity, no matter how different. Leave your skin color, leave your ethnicity, leave the voice of your land. Step free of your denomination. Release the burden of pious thought. Gather where the spirit beckons and call yourselves His beloved. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr  https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

I woke in the morning while the new day was in its infancy, and began searching for an item lost, yet never truly possessed. A pearl, a rare coin, a valuable asset to my soul. I had no illumination. Darkness ruled. Its prince holding me firmly in his grasp. Pulling me below the horizon. Into the shadows cast in dark corners. Existing only to defile the light. One ray of hope. One soft glimpse of morning light reaches the plain wall in the room in which my nights are spent. And in its glow I see hung from one rusted nail, my pearl, my rare coin, my salvation. copyright 2014 - Donald P James Jr https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author

Come, you who have never felt righteous enough to seek me. Come, you who have covered your hearts in filthy layers of sin. Come, you who have nothing to offer in return. Come, you who have been cast out by the hour's religion. Come, you who struggle with the burdens laid upon your shoulders. Come, in your desperation to be loved. copyright 2016 - Donald P James Jr  https://www.amazon.com/stores/Donald-P.-James-Jr./author