Pride or Love

For a gift he received a quite beautiful dove,

With which he could cherish and learn about love.

Young children are anxious to have all they will

Of love, and affection, and of devotion their fill

He would not let go of this small precious gift

For fear of it departing and flying so swift

The dove as her nature was to fly and be free

To grow in her beauty and see all she could see

She’d always return to the place of her rest

But the young little boy knew not of this test

He began to grow weary of her desire for release

For he feared her rejection and this stole his peace

Why did she not do all of his will?

Why would she not give of her devotion his fill?

The lust for her affection drove him to rule

Ignoring his conscience which calleth him cruel

Her design as a dove became the thing of his dread

‘Til one day he found the little dove dead

His father then spoke to him of this once precious gift

How he forbade it to grow, or to fly and be swift

Son ‘tis your pride that destroyeth much good

Your fear of rejection that you’ve not understood

For you demand of this dove a thing cruel and odd

A degree of devotion belonging only to God

But God ruleth us with neither rigor nor force

For it pleaseth Him to see love as the source

With the rod and reproof in God’s way was he taught

And in silence and pain began forming his thought

‘Love is a will freely joining another

A continual choice to be yours and no other’

‘The wills must be equal in depth and degree

In order to be love, which continually is free’

He now rightly knew that pride was not so

But it would destroy and never let go.

Pride and Love he could see were both movements of will

A faint subtlety was that love does not steal

And while pride can be seen in both the cruel and the odd

Love wants the best and toucheth not the glory of God.