Love That Casts Out Fear

I guess this is more Evening Manna...
   Tonight I was drawn to my old 1940 Episcopal hymnal. I took it to the piano and plucked out the soprano and alto parts (that's as far as my piano skills will take me) of some of its beautiful hymns.  I began to sing along, as I did when I was a young child, and my parents bought me a little 'organ' which contained about an octave and a half and some chord buttons.  But I was unprepared for the depth of emotion that was stirred within me, as all the verses to hymns I hadn't sung for decades came back to me.  The Father used these hymns...both their poetry and their music to touch me long ago...to show me His heart.  As anyone who knows me well can tell you, I love contemporary Christian music...but there is treasure, also, to be found in this heritage. It saddens me to see how far the church I grew up in has wandered from the Scriptures.  However, these poignant hymns are full of the Word of God, and I hope we never lose them.  Here's one I sang tonight.  Wish I could share it with the music...  [Found a way to add it now, but I'm having issues editing this post. Will add in new post for Sept. 9, if you care to hear the tune.]

O love that casts out fear
O love that casts out sin
Tarry no more without,
But come and dwell within.

True sunlight of the soul,
Surround us as we go
So shall our way be safe,
Our feet no straying know.


Great love of God, come in!
Wellspring of heavenly peace
Thou Living Water, come!
Spring up, and never cease.

Love of the living God,
Of Father and of Son
Love of the Holy Ghost,
Fill Thou each needy one.
      --Horatius Bonar, 1861

Making Plans

Several friends have been asking me when I plan to retire. Drew and I have talked this through from both a financial and ministry standpoint.  However I have to preface my answer with James 4:13-14 (below).  Anyone making plans under the assumption that all will continue as it has been, is deceiving himself.  I am more aware than ever that every moment we live, any future we have,  is totally dependent on the grace of God.  In the past, I would have affirmed this truth most assuredly. But now, in these times, its burning reality is more apparent to me than ever. The question has also offered me a segue to share with friends my total dependence on Him who gives me my very breath.

"Come now, you who say 'Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a city and carry on our business and make money.' Yet you do not know the least thing about what may happen tomorrow. What is the nature of your life?  You are really but a whisp of vapor, a puff of smoke, a mist that is visible for a while and then disappears into thin air." [James 4:13-14, Amplified Version]

Confused?

I listen to several excellent speakers and Bible teachers, whom I trust and respect,  for edification and encouragement in the mornings while I'm getting ready for work. Afterwards, I sit to have quiet time with the Lord.  Sometimes, these dedicated teachers appear to be saying things diametrically opposed to one another....to go far in one direction at the  expense of another truth. So, I was asking God who was correct...whom to believe...when they all appeared to convincingly be speaking truth.  Here is His response, as best I could record it. Maybe it will help someone else with a similar question on his heart.
I am here, Child, listening to your every heart's cry. I promise to guide you and teach you...to show you revelation. No one on earth has everything correct. Don't worry. I have given them each a role to play. Glean the truth I personally am communicating to you at the moment. Do not close your mind to any true believers and what they have to share. You each have gems to outstretch. Put together, they offer a sparkling array.

Unfolding Your Hand

The One I've come to know through the past four decades...the One Of Whom I experienced sporadic glimpses even in childhood...the One Who kept calling to me through years of darkness.....Who would ever not want to run with utter abandon towards Him and gratefully throw one's arms around Him?  Who would not run happily into the sunlight from the prison of oneself....or reach up for His Hand from the midst of the raging sea of this world's madness?  How do I communicate the joy, the peace, the assurance, the contentment, the very Person of the One who loves us so lavishly?  How?  They must meet Him for themselves, and the scales will fall from their eyes, as they fell from mine when I experienced His overwhelming Presence. But I must be bold to introduce them, not being content to clutch this joy to myself, hugging it like a selfish child who runs to her room and locks the door behind her.  Help me to unfold my hand, Lord, and share the treasure You placed there.

True Security

In these final days of this Shemitah year, as we approach mid-September, I can feel God's creation silently vibrating,  as if we're in the eye of the hurricane, so to speak (or "as it was in the days of Noah" [Matt 24:36-38] ...with everyone going about their business not knowing what was to come.). I don't know what is going to happen in this summation of the year of four blood moons, the reappearance of the Star of Bethlehem, and this year of Shemitah/Jubilee. But this I do know:  we better know where our true security lies and hang tightly to His hand, hidden and resting in Him....and seeking to draw everyone we know and love into His Sheepfold. It is out-of-fashion to remind one another of the awe and reverence due to God, but we must not remake Him in our own image or ever forget that it is only by His infinite Love and Grace, expressed through Jesus, that we are rescued from what, otherwise, the Enemy has in store for us.  Anyone reading this blog probably knows this profound truth. But all of us can become entangled in our day-to-day lives and lose a sense of the urgency of the times. Don't let your courage falter in reaching out to those who, as far as you know, do not see, or who have not yet accepted, His outstretched hand. Let no one be lost whose hand we could have taken and helped lead to His feet.

Hebrews 12:25-29:
So see to it that you do not reject Him or refuse to listen to and heed Him Who is speaking.......Then [at Mt. Sinai] His voice shook the earth, but now He has given us a promise:  Yet once more I will shake and make tremble not only the earth but also the [starry] heavens. Now this expression, Yet once more, indicates the final removal and transformation of all [that can be] shaken--that is, of that which has been created-- in order that what cannot be shaken may remain and continue. Let us therefore, receiving a kingdom that is firm and stable and cannot be shaken, offer to God pleasing service and acceptable worship, with modesty and pious care and godly fear* and awe, for our God is a consuming fire." 

*"affectionate reverence"

The Right Dress

Dear Adonai,
   I want to look lovely for You. I know You look deep inside, not at outer adornment.  Help me dress in loveliness of heart, of soul, of spirit, within the unique personality in which you take delight....A many-faceted snowflake floating alongside the other unique shapes that comprise Your Body....Treasured, one-of-a-kind, yet forming a whole curtain of gently falling snow.  May we be a snowshower of blessing on the hard, dry ground of this world. May we be willing to melt in humility, losing ourselves for Your sake, yet still treasured and whole in Your sight.

Always

It is difficult not to be fearful knowing what's coming (if not specifically, certainly its import).  So I thought I'd share a little something (also with great import) with which God assuaged my fears yesterday.

Always...I am here.
Always...I love you.
Always...I hear your cry.
Always...I answer.
Always...you are Mine.
Always...your love is precious to Me.
Be still, My Heart.  Be at peace...
Always.

Not Handsome But Beautiful

Leaking again....brought to tears by Beth Moore's passage in her older book, Things Pondered. Wish I could reproduce the whole section here....It's called Beautiful. Yeshua was in no way handsome while He was on the earth, according to Scripture. Yet He was like no other for His Beauty of person. Just a section of Beth's prose regarding this truth:
"Maybe it was Your eyes. Those eyes that showered the fullest attention on whomever you encountered.  Eyes that fastened with such focus that I would have run...if I could have moved. Eyes that I realized knew everything there was to know about me. But eyes that reassured, "It is I...be not afraid."

--Things Pondered by Beth Moore; p.143
FYI: the first part of this book had me in stitches. I never know whether I'll be laughing or crying when I Read a chapter.

Half-Listening

My right ear has been plugged off and on for months.  The flight home to Florida didn't help.  I've tried an earwax removal kit with no success so far.  It suddenly strikes me, as I sit here in my "prayer chair," that the Holy Spirit has a message for me in there somewhere. Have I been only half-listening to You, Lord?  Is my mind so often taken up with other occupations that I only hear Your whisper as from a distance? "I'll be there in just a minute, Lord.  Just have to take care of a few things.  Then I can focus my full attention on what You have to say.  Oh, my...look at the time. Tomorrow, Lord, tomorrow I'll be fully present with You, both spiritual ears fully attuned.  Soon....I promise...tomorrow...yes,,tomorrow.."
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