Simon Peter

It wasn’t I, Lord —
It wasn’t I who asked, “Could I follow You?”
It was You who called across the waves,
“Follow Me!”
I have no clue why You picked me
to go with You, clod that I am.
But I followed, with my brother.
We came along, but we didn’t exactly understand.
At least I didn’t — not then.
We knew there was something special about You,
but we couldn’t quite connect the dots.
I should have known
when I tried to walk to You on the water.
It wasn’t I, Lord,
who pulled me back up after I lost my nerve.
It was You.
Finally, at Caesarea Philippi,
I took a stab at it:
“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!”
But it wasn’t I, Lord —
It wasn’t I who came up with that idea.
You, Yourself, showed me
that it came from Your Father.
And then You said You would have to die —
die in Jerusalem, of all places!
The City of the Great King
ought to know its true King!
So I told You what I thought of that idea —
“It’ll never happen!”
But it wasn’t I who said it.
Again, You told me who said it —
not I, but Satan
playing around with my fears.
Then You took us up the mountain.
I have no clue why You picked me
to go with You, clod that I am.
And, again, when I saw You with Moses and Elijah
I opened my big mouth.
“Let’s put up some tents
so you all can all stick around for a while,
and we can enjoy this great spiritual ‘high.’”
But it wasn’t I who said that —
I just didn’t know what to say
so I blurted out whatever came into my head.
Then, once we got to Jerusalem
and everybody hailed You as the King,
and then changed their minds
like the fickle people we are,
You took me to the Garden to pray.
I have no clue why You picked me
to go with You, clod that I am,
because I fell asleep with the others.
Somebody should have stayed awake,
but it wasn’t I, Lord.
And it wasn’t I
who stuck with You
when they put You on trial.
Nobody did, except Your Father.
I stood there, like a jerk,
trying to get warm
and claiming I didn’t even know You.
When You went to the Place of the Skull
somebody had to carry Your cross.
But it wasn’t I, Lord.
It was some guy from Cyrene
who just happened to be passing by.
I snuck along behind, with the others.
And when You hung there, in agony,
You wanted to make sure
somebody would take care of Your Mom.
And it wasn’t I, Lord,
who was handy just then —
it was John, bless his heart!
When You rose again out of the tomb,
it wasn’t I, Lord,
who got there first.
It was John,
though, bless him,
he let me go inside first.
I have no clue why he waited for me,
clod that I am.
Then, when the question came up
whether I really loved You,
it wasn’t I, Lord,
who thought there was a problem.
You had to press me on it
because You knew I hadn’t thought it through.
Okay, maybe I got a few things right, in the end.
I was the first to announce to our people
that You had been raised from the dead
as Lord and Messiah.
But, again, it wasn’t I, Lord,
who came up with that —
it was Your Holy Spirit.
And then when people got healed
just falling down in my shadow
it wasn’t I, Lord.
It was You.
It was always about You.

Published in The Promise by Shirley A. Leonard
©2007,2011 Laudemont Press