Since I preached on this text last Sunday (John 8:57), I decided to dig into my files to find the first poem I ever published for money. Five dollars. It was in the September, 1969 issue of Christian Life (p. 68).

Five dollars may have been just about right for the poem, but the truth is worth billions.

In that land
Were some birds
And some grass
And very much dust
And a number of common folk
With a lot of simplicity
And wisdom;
      So it was not unnatural
        That they should expect
The grass to wither
And the birds to fall dead from the sky
When one of their friends,
Looking over his shoulder
Somehow like an ordinary man,
Said,
“Before Abraham was, I  AM.”