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JUDGE DREAD
I expected someone larger than life,
The Hollywood version of coy,
Brazen, hissing, red with horns,
Hunting for someone to destroy.
Instead, what I saw was broken,
An angel without any joy,
Eaten from within by jealousy,
Living from ploy to ploy.
Once the pinnacle of music,
Once an instrument of God,
Once a star draped in jewels,
Now only demons applaud.
Shattered, desperate and withered,
Too much conspiracy on his plate,
He wasn’t designed for such scheming,
It would break him under its weight.
Losing his voice was worse than death,
He needed breath to woo a man,
For only the words of humans … not his,
Could trigger an earthly plan.
He would have spoken into a vacuum,
If not for the yielding ears of most,
Who took his words and repeated them,
In the face of God … his boast.
He did not like the pecking order,
He did not like humans at all,
They had authority in God’s image,
So he tempted them in the fall.
He tried to steal their breath away,
But the only way he could,
Was to teach them to doubt and quiver,
Like no child of God ever should.
He lied that their God was weak,
Instead of … “I am that I am”,
He convinced them to trade a seat in paradise,
For a seat in the place of the dammed.
A miserable creature … no respecter of life,
He hates the unborn, children, and kings,
He relentlessly tries to plunder their souls,
Of stealing their light ... he sings.
When we met, he did not look at me,
Thank God, I thought it was chance,
I did not want to make eye contact,
Too much exchanged in a glance.
I did not know my breath was my own,
Nor that I should not fear,
I did not know my words were chains,
To the darkness so evil and near.
Then through the door to the twisting stairs,
Where he had ushered many before,
He was now being ushered himself,
And could not turn back … any more.
I acted in the moment,
No time to wonder "Why?"
I tried to keep my focus,
Afraid I might just die.
Spelunking with the “Fallen One”,
Down earthen steps we tread,
Winding, dark, jagged walls,
A spiral of the dead.
Then finally at the bottom,
Upon a narrow ledge,
The darkness was overwhelming,
As we neared the very edge.
There at the brink of the great divide,
There a chasm so deep and wide,
There I feared the other side,
For I had no place to turn and hide.
I could not go any further,
But he just stepped across,
Was this the place that he called home?
Was this where he was boss?
I would have been forever amiss,
If I had not seen what happened next,
For he stepped into a dark chasm,
As if following an ancient text.
Then a Presence … Greater than he,
Compelled him in on bended knee,
Long since defeated by the tree,
The devil had no power to flee.
The cavern glowed a crimson red,
The hue that bends the least,
The outer ring of the Presence of God,
The primary colour of the deceased.
The light grew thicker and brighter,
Though I could not see its source,
The Terrible Presence bid him in,
An unfathomably, mighty force.
Then to my surprise! … God Himself emerged!
“Give him no place!” was His plea,
“For if you have to choose a Judge Dread,
Then save yourself … and choose Me!”
Sheila Willar - September 16, 2005
(revised April 01, 2020)
Choose your Judge Dread wisely!
Isaiah 8:13 KJV
Sanctify the LORD of hosts Himself;
And let Him be your fear,
and let Him be your dread.
Luke 12:5 KJV
But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear:
Fear Him,
which after He hath killed hath power to cast into hell;
Yea, I say unto you, Fear Him.
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