A Stone Wall Steadfast in A Winter Wind
by Donavon L Riley

World leaders grapple with the earth as if their schemes could domesticate its untamed rhythms. They carve treaties into the soil, as though words could bind what is boundless. They hammer laws into the heavens, thinking edicts could hold sway over stars. But their efforts falter at the wild edges of what is, their trembling maps and models unable to comprehend the great, unruly pulse of life. The Maker of all resists such fetters, and so wherever the snowy-haired Christ steps, there is breaking—not a destruction, but a clearing. What bows to Him is remade; what defies Him turns to ash.

This breaking is not chaos but transformation. To the faithful, Christ is no abstraction, no distant idea framed in stained glass. He is the life tree whose roots anchor even our frailty. The confirmation of our trust, He steadies the world’s mad spinning, restoring the breath that chaos steals. In His presence is the beauty of the Church and the might of kings—powers that do not crush but uplift. He is the doom of demons, the glinting spear that pierces darkness and reshapes those that pray to be made new. His work is no hollow promise but a total remaking, sweeping bitterness into nothingness and building strength at the foundation.

Meanwhile, the towers of men crumble. The plans of power grow quiet as moths in the night. Yet Christ stands unmoved, a stone wall steadfast in a winter wind. He guards the weak, tending to their bruised bodies. He sings to the broken-hearted, His voice soothes the bones of the earth, healing what once was barren. He does not demand greatness but instead reveals that greatness lies in surrender. The world totters while He endures—the true shaper of time, the seal of an unyielding peace.

This is why the Church, bold in its joy, proclaims: Jesus Christ is not a trite sentiment or a hollow emblem held aloft in vain ceremony. He is the song of the living earth, the harmony that holds all things together, inviting all to rise anew in His eternal and steadying rhythm.