Poems (Howard)/The Church of the Good Shepherd

by Hattie Howard

The Church of the Good Shepherd.

Beyond the smoke, beyond the sound
 Of crowded habitation,
With gables quaint and steeple crowned,
It stands upon a rise of ground
 Of charming situation;
And city folk as Christians found,
With rural dwellers miles around,
 Make up the congregation.

Beyond obnoxious dust and heat,
 By ancient elms surrounded,
An edifice unique and neat
As choice suburban country-seat
 Its patroness hath founded,
In whose calm Sabbath-like retreat
From choir and organ anthems sweet
 Of praise have long resounded.

A vast symmetric pile, ornate
 With arch and cantalever,
With tiles antique that tessellate
The spacious roof elaborate;
 And spire suggesting ever
A thought of Him supremely great
Who doth approve and stimulate
 Each nobly-meant endeavor.

Rare arabesques like raveled lace,
 From architrave to ceiling,
Embellish niches that encase
Fair cherubim, in classic grace
 The sculptor's art revealing,
That overlook the chancel-space
Like sentinels to guard the place
 When waiting saints are kneeling.

Oh, not in temples thus upreared
 And richly decorated,
Our fathers worshiped, who revered
The God they loved no less than feared,
 But humbly congregated
In sylvan shades to them endeared
As Bethels where, till He appeared,
 They fasted, prayed, and waited.

Forever blest the hand that brings,
 Rebuking pride and malice,
This noblest, best of offerings—
The gift that speaketh better things
 From wealth's o'erflowing chalice,
Than monuments to buried kings,
Or ostentatious pomp that clings
 Around some stately palace.

May all who throng its transept take
 New zeal from that old story
Of One "as man who never spake,"
Till notes of gratitude shall break
 The solemn offertory,
And labor wrought for Jesus' sake
This "Church of the Good Shepherd" make
 The gateway unto glory.