Psalm 139:1-12

Oh LORD,

you have examined my heart

and know everything about me.

You know when I sit down or stand up.

You know my every thought when far away.

You chart the path ahead of me

and tell me where to stop and rest.

Every moment you know where I am.

You know what I am going to say

even before I say it, LORD.

You procede

and follow me.

You place your hand of blessing on my head.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,

too great for me to know!

I can never escape from your Spirit!

I can never get away from your presence!

If I go up to heaven,

you are there;

if I go down to the place of the dead,

you are there.

If I ride the wings of the morning,

if I dwell by the farthest oceans,

even there

your hand will guide me,

and your strength will support me.

I could ask the darkness to hid me

and the light to become night-

but even in darkness

I cannot hide from you.

Grandma's Prayers

Yesterday at Women's Bible Study,most of us shared a song that exalted our Lord declaring as David, God's awesome love, majesty and power. God had placed a different type of song on my heart, it reflected my burden and new found commitment to God's plan of:

"A new revival even as we pray and sing,

we're on our knees,

we're on our knees,

I see a generation raising up to take it's place,

the whole world sings,

the whole world sings,

Hosanna, Hosanna,

glory in the highest."

Last night only hours after I'd declared my faith in what I expected God was going to do, our phone rang...

"Hello! Hi grandma? High doll what's up?

Do you remember when I was really little, you and grandpa gave mom some Savings Bonds to hold for me until I was an adult? Yes of course. Well mom said I should call and tell you how I will be using them, that it would mean a lot to you.

The church is putting together a group for a missions trip to Africa in two months. Because they know how much I love children and how outgoing I am, they asked me to be part of the team and I am going to use the bonds to help fund the trip.

I really feel God has been calling me to maturity. There are some things I have really been wanting to buy for our home, but I distinctly knew the Lord was saying, remember those children in Africa who don't even have food? And you have so much! Do you really think you need that? I felt like it was a little spanking to help Him get through to me."

I said, "Sweetheart, He wasn't spanking you. He is only beginning what will turn into a life long class of lovingly teaching you."

She is 25 and the oldest grandchild. She uses FaceBook to display hundreds of photos taken of her, she has been desperate to be a photo model! Before that the photos were all of her partying with her friends, as though she was defying all the righteous truths she had ever been taught to embrace. The worst thing seemed to be her influence on our younger grandchildren, who were following her as if she were the Pied Piper and I thought my heart would break.

BUT THEN GOD BROKE THROUGH WITH HIS PLANS!

Of course she has NO idea what he is really doing, or how many ways He will use this trip. But I know Him! And I know He's up to something BIG, that's going to impact lives for eternity.

I can only sing, "Hosanna, hosanna, glory in the highest, glory in the highest!" I know He is mightily at work answering prayers!!!

Of course her mom is right, Grandpa and I could never have imagined that God would use the Savings Bonds for this!!

Lent and Contemplating the Cross

Today and every day, God the Father extends an invitation- to actors and mechanics, schoolteachers and bright-eyed children, preachers and bartenders, accountants and garbage collectors, gamblers and homemakers. It is an eternal and unchanging summons to kneel in the shadow of that cross, where He sacrificed His only Son, and make it our soul's home.

From Contemplating the Cross

By Tricia McCary Rhodes

One Thing

ONE THING....

One thing I ask of the Lord....

this is what I seek...

Oh God, give me an undivided heart.

Teach me your way, O Lord, and I will walk in your truth;

give me an undivided heart,

that I may fear your name.

I will praise You, O Lord my God,

with all my heart;

I will glorify your Name forever,

For great is your love toward me;

you have delivered my soul

from the depths of the grave.

Psalm 86:11-13

My heart says of you,

"Seek His face!"

Your face will I seek.

Teach me your way, O Lord;

lead me in a straight path.

One thing.

"For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth

to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to Him."

2 Chronicles 16:9

O Lord, help me to have one thing in mind.

You!

Step by Step

In God have I put my trust and confident reliance; I will not be afraid.

What can man do to me? Your vows are upon me, O God;

I will render praise to You and give You thank offerings.

For You have delivered my life from death,

yes and my feet from falling

that I may walk before God in the light of life and of the living.

Psalm 56:11-13

Jesus is the One God sent to banish the darkness. His light leads us from death to life. He is the One Who keeps our feet from falling that we may walk before God. He has made a way for us that is so complete and so good.

Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.

Psalm 119:105

He gives us just enough light for us to see...the next step. Sometimes maybe a glimpse of a bit more, but for sure enough for us to see the path before us. This is how we walk with Him, step by step, following the light on the path. We do not have to fumble around in the darkness. He is the Word and He is the Light. He shows us the way to go.

I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.

John 12:46

Take a Pen and Paper

Take a Pen and Paper

By Jill Briscoe

Taken from Jill's book

The Deep Place Where Nobody Goes

Try taking a pen and paper to the Deep Place where nobody goes. Then you can read His letters in the Golden Book and write a reply.

I write it out on paper and I think my thoughts out loud

I speak my heart's foreboding and I pray about the cloud

Of deep and dark depression and a sense of dread and doubt

So I write it out on paper and I get my feelings out.

Then I take it to the Throne Room and leave it there above

And I know that I am understood with sympathy and love

I wait a while in silence till the Spirit meets me there

And He takes my piece of paper and He turns it into a prayer.

I bring my tired believing and my faith that pants for power

And I lay it at the altar in this quiet, scared hour

And I ask for fire igniting weary faith and dying hope

And I cry for stern believing and I seek for power to cope.

Then I read the treasured Scripture that will lift my spirits high

Turn tears to precious laughter and kiss my fears goodbye

I wait until He clams me down and nerves me for the fight

And then He leads me upwards and onwards in the night.

So I revel in these moments in the shadow of the Throne

Where I hear the Father's voice like many waters falling down

There's freedom and forgiveness and unremitting love

So I hate to leave the Throne Room for the shallow place above!

Sleeping forgiven, waking to grace

Nightmares forgotten, things back in place

Coming close to His footstool in the Throne Room above

He settles my soul, and I listen to love.

Faithful High Priest

Hebrews 2:17-18

So it is evident that it was essential that He be made like His brethren in every respect, in order that He might become a merciful (sympathetic) and faithful High Priest in the things related to God, to make atonement and propitiation for the people's sins. For because He Himself [in His humanity] has suffered in being tempted (tested and tried), He is able [immediately] to run to the cry of (assist, relieve) those who are being tempted and tested and tried [and who therefore are being exposed to suffering].

I don't know why, but it is of such great comfort that Jesus knows what I go through. Not only that, but He comes to my rescue and makes a way for me to move past the trials and temptations of life. This version (amp) states that it was essential for Him to be like us in every respect (except without sin). I am so thankful that He really really knows and understands what it is like for us as we struggle. I am so thankful that I can cry out to One who can relate, One who hears and One who rescues. You and You alone, O LORD, are worthy of any and all worship and praise.

Things Not Seen

From Charles Spurgeon's Morning and Evening:

"The things which are not seen."
— 2 Corinthians 4:18

In our Christian pilgrimage it is well, for the most part, to be looking forward. Forward lies the crown, and onward is the goal. Whether it be for hope, for joy, for consolation, or for the inspiring of our love, the future must, after all, be the grand object of the eye of faith. Looking into the future we see sin cast out, the body of sin and death destroyed, the soul made perfect, and fit to be a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light. Looking further yet, the believer's enlightened eye can see death's river passed, the gloomy stream forded, and the hills of light attained on which standeth the celestial city; he seeth himself enter within the pearly gates, hailed as more than conqueror, crowned by the hand of Christ, embraced in the arms of Jesus, glorified with Him, and made to sit together with Him on His throne, even as He has overcome and has sat down with the Father on His throne. The thought of this future may well relieve the darkness of the past and the gloom of the present. The joys of heaven will surely compensate for the sorrows of earth. Hush, hush, my doubts! death is but a narrow stream, and thou shalt soon have forded it. Time, how short—eternity, how long! Death, how brief—immortality, how endless! Methinks I even now eat of Eshcol's clusters, and sip of the well which is within the gate. The road is so, so short! I shall soon be there.

"When the world my heart is rending

With its heaviest storm of care,

My glad thoughts to heaven ascending,

Find a refuge from despair.

Faith's bright vision shall sustain me

Till life's pilgrimage is past;

Fears may vex and troubles pain me,

I shall reach my home at last."

The Unseen Eternal

I wrote earlier about our inability to dwell fully with God until we go to be with Him. Today God has shown me, reminded me that He dwells in me--that I AM home because He is with me. I know that I exist with Him in the spritiual realm--now, as I live here in this body. It seems so unreal, while the struggles of this body seem so immediate. Strangely, the opposite is true. The Bible says that which we see is temporal and fleeting, while it is the unseen that is eternal...