My spirit on Thy care,
Blest Savior, I recline;
Thou wilt not leave me to despair,
For Thou art Love divine.
In Thee I place my trust,
On Thee I calmly rest;
I know Thee good, I know Thee just,
And count Thy choice the best.
Whate’er events betide,
Thy will they all perform;
Safe in Thy breast my head I hide,
Nor fear the coming storm.
Let good or ill befall,
It must be good for me;
Secure of having Thee in all,
Of having all in Thee.
-Henry F. White
There they dwelt with the King for His work
What is your work? Whatever it be, the Lord, the King, has done that kind of work Himself, and you dwell with Him here for His work.
Is your work with the little children, carrying them about, loving them?
In His love and in His pity He redeemed them; and He bare them, and carried them all the days of old. Thou hast seen how that the Lord thy God bare thee, as a man doth bear his son, in all the ways that ye went.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell with Him here for His work.
Is your work teaching the children to walk, giving them their food?
God says, When Israel was a child, then I loved him, And I it was that taught Ephraim to walk,–He took them upon His arms. I drew them with bands of a man, with cords of love; I gently caused them to eat.
Is your work to ‘mother’, comfort and strengthen?
As one whom his mother comforted, so will I comfort you, saith the Lord. The word comfort is from two Latin words meaning ‘with’ and ‘strong’ –He is with us to make us strong. Comfort is not soft, weakening commiseration; it is true, strengthening love.
Is your work the disciplining of younger brothers and sisters, patiently and lovingly leading them on, holding them unfalteringly to God’s highest?
What son is there whom his Father does not discipline? He does it for our certain good in order that we may become sharers in His own holy character.
Is your work in the sewing-room?
Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skin, and clothed them.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work cooking, lighting fires in the kitchen in the early morning, getting food ready for others?
When the morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore; but the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. As soon then as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread. Jesus saith unto them, Come this way and have breakfast.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work tending people, washing patients?
Jesus riseth from supper, and laid aside His garments; and took a towel, and girded Himself. After that He poureth water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith He was girded.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work nursing, bandaging sores?
He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work cleaning?
I will cleanse them from all their iniquity–that is harder work that cleaning floors or washing clothes.
Is your work writing–writing on a blackboard in school, writing in the office, answering letters?
He declared unto you His covenant, which He commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and He wrote them upon two tables of stone. The Lord shall count when He writeth up the people, that this man was born there. God says, I have written to him the great things of My law. Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground. They are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work account-keeping, teaching or learning arithmetic, or the names of things hard to remember?
He telleth the names of the stars; He calleth them all by their names. Even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work in the farm with the animals?
He shall feed His flock like a shepherd: He shall gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom.
Is your work in the engine-room, or the carpentering shops? Is it making things or mending things?
O give thanks unto the Lord that made great lights. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God. (The verb is the same as that used in Matt. 4:21, mending their nets.) Is not this the Carpenter? and they were offended at Him.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work praying for others, enduring temptation, suffering for His sake?
He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem. Jesus kneeled down and prayed. And, being in an agony, He prayed more earnestly: and His sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows. He, for the joy that was set before Him, endured the Cross.
He has done the work that you are doing. You dwell here with the King for His work.
Is your work to take the Gospel to those who need it, but do not know their need?
Your King did that work: I have spread out My hands all the day unto a rebellious people, which walketh in a way that was not good, after their own thoughts. In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink. But our Lord did more than speak, He went about doing good. Dwell thus with the King for His work.
~Murray Webb-Peploe, in Amy Carmichael, Kohila: The Shaping of an Indian Nurse
I scarce know what to say- where to begin.Who would have thought it? There are many miles between me and the girl who didn’t know what to expect petitioning for the first time nearly a year ago. There are many changes between the small group in our living room at the end of 2008 and the group gathered at the Secretary of State’s office today. And I can honestly say, I would never trade it- I wouldn’t trade it. “Who could have thought of such joy for us but He whose name is Love?”
I am at a loss as to how to begin to tell of how much He’s taught me- how much I’ve seen of Him this year. How is it that I can call this Saviour mine?!?This great King of Love- how is it that I can claim Him? He who does all things well? Yet He, even He, is mine and I am His- how can my human mind wrap around this? “What may I say of Him? let us go & see.”
He uses everything- everything in our lives to bring us Christward. This year, it was this.
I’ve been so many places this year- talked to so many people- looked into so many eyes. I have had so many experiences I will likely carry for the rest of my life, met so many people I cannot forget. I treasure those memories. I count some of those people as dearest friends- some, I count as brother. As sister. Who would ever have thought it? Listen, unbeliever, listen! All the incredible things you have heard of Him- what He has told us- it is true.And when you have come to Him, you cannot leave. His loveliness will captivate your heart- there is no life outside of Him. What is the existence I called life before? In Him is life, and that life is the light of men. The true light, which enlightens everyone, has come into the world. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
I have tried to walk in my own strength, and have fallen .I have cast myself on Christ, and have found Him sufficient. I have forgotten, but He has not forgotten. Sometimes I wonder, how can I hold it all? “I wonder now, what was it made me wait so long?” I didn’t know it would be like this. I did not know. “How can they live without Jesus?” I know that I had to have Him, but I had noidea it would be quite like this. O the depth of the riches of everything that is ours in Christ! I cannot mention all the people, all the events, because I know I would forget some. I have spent more time away from my family than in all the rest of my life combined. I have missed my family and my beloved Church so acutely at times- and have found that Christ is enough. I wouldn’t change the way He worked things- I am in a position to say that I would not change it.
We cannot look to circumstances to draw our strength, our hope from them. Our hope is found in Christ alone- He it is who has been our captain. How faithless we have been- but He is God. The gates of hell cannot prevail against His anointed. Why do we doubt? Why do we foolishly fear? And had we not turned in over 100,000 signatures today, it would have been no defeat. Christ has overcome the world- and it has been His good pleasure in doing so to grant us what we so desperately wanted. The morning has dawned for preborn children in Mississippi, but not because of us. Not because of the signatures. It is because the true light, which enlightens has come into the world. It is because He has seen fit to work in and through His people. What may I say of Him? Come, come and see?
So what do y’all think Mercy is talking about?
“Our brother in law is getting married.” Tyler?
“Who can I be married to?” No one yet.
“But I can be married to someone, when I’m walking down the island.” The island?
“As soon as he got home, he went to the larder; and he stood on a chair, and took down a very large jar of peanut butter from the top shelf. It had PEANUT BUTTER written on it, but, just to make sure, he took off the paper cover and looked at it, and it looked just like peanut butter.”But you never can tell,” said Josiah. “I remember my uncle saying once that he had seen cheese just this colour.” So he put his tongue in, and took a large lick. Yes,” he said, “it is. No doubt about that. And peanut butter, I should say, right down to the bottom of the jar. Unless, of course,” he said, “somebody put cheese in at the bottom just for a joke. Perhaps I had better go a little further … just in case … in case Heffalumps don’t like cheese … same as me … Ah!” And he gave a deep sigh. “I was right. It is peanut butter, right the way down.”
A.A. Milne, Winnie-The-Pooh (personalisation added)
O.K, so I’m FINALLY posting the second part on this subject… although those who didn’t know I even had a second part probably didn’t notice… hmm…
First, visit the websites of Project Hopeful, Ahope, and the some of the sites listed here. Go ahead, do it. Read There Is No Me Without You (((older readers))). Research HIV.
Did you do it? Now consider what you have read: HIV is not so easily transmitted nor so “scary” as you might have thought. Now consider this: even if it was, that would be no excuse for God’s people to neglect His call to care for the “least of these.” Isn’t His carrying our disease and conquering us with His love enough to compel us to us to carry them- their sickness and their souls- before His throne? Isn’t it enough to inspire us to show them that love? Do we believe that the love of Christ is enough? Do we believe it will reach even them? “‘Love never fails’- is love failing now?” (Amy Carmichael)
“Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him.” Mark 1:16-18
Press on, Christian, take heart! “Nothing ordinary is equal to this new call.” (Amy Carmichael) – and yet it is so “normal”, so natural, it seems like it should be so “natural” that a child should follow his Father- his loving, perfect Father- about where ever and to whatever He calls- won’t we follow freely out of love? Don’t kick your feet and scream, you have no idea of the joy He has prepared for those who with their whole hearts follow.
And really, that is why nothing ordinary is equal to it- because of the joy. Nothing ordinary is equal to a Babe born of a virgin. Nothing ordinary is equal to His sinless life. Nothing ordinary is equal to His redemptive death. Nothing ordinary is equal to His saving work in sinners souls. And so we are compelled to ask “can anything be equal to following His call?” No, nothing.
I – and, I trust, some of my readers – know to some degree what to some degree what it means to have Christ come and make a home in our hearts. Sometimes, even now, we still try to treat Him (as Pastor John might be heard to say) as a house guest- a vsitor. We say “make Yourself at home”, but we would think t terribly presumptuous if He came into “that one closet” – the closet in which we try to hide our sin, not rememberng that it was in front of His face, and He saw it, when that sin was first committed. Do we really want to wait for Him to go into the closet “uninvited” to remember that He already knows about those things, to remember that He already carried them to the cross on His own spotless shoulders anddied to wash them away? How long until the freedom freely offered will be freely received? Blessed are we when we do not tarry to open the closet door and give Him our whole hearts! Blessed are we when we do not tarry to accept the gift of freedom from all those things, all the things in the closet. Blessed are we when we do not tarry to beg and plead for Him to come and do away with all of the sins creeping about His home- do we think that the Sinless One desires to share a home with out pet sins? I am not talking about the unconverted, but of the believer who who goes through seasons of striving with his Beloved for another last drink of sin; and foolishly tries to hide it away for a time when He Who sees all is not looking- and in our great foolishness we think to hid it in His very home. We must learn to give it all to Him, for He requires a whole heart.
Now, just a few words of comfort before I go: He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust – We have not a High Priest Who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses – “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.”
Open wide your heart and know the Joy which He alone gives.
SOLA DEO GLORIA!!!
“…They have made their faces harder than rock; they have refused to repent.” –Jeremiah 5:3
I was defiant.
“…All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” — Romans 3:23
I was disobedient.
“All we like sheep have gone astray…” —Isaiah 53:6
I was wayward.
“You have been rebellious against the Lord from the day that I knew you.” —Deuteronomy 10:24
I was rebellious.
“… Every fool will be quarreling.” —Proverbs 20:3
I was argumentative.
“The heart is deceitful above all things…” —Jeremiah 17:9
I was deceitful.
“…Desolation and destruction are in their highways.” —Jeremiah 59:7
I was destructive.
“… by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.” —Ephesians 2:3
I was angry.
“Why is my pain unceasing, my wound uncurable, refusing to be healed?” —Jeremiah 15:18
I was broken.
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“For you did not recieve the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have recieved the spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!'”— Romans 8:15
Yet He adopted me.
“And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘know the Lord,’ for they shall all know Me… ” —Jeremiah 31:34
He made Himself known to me.
“…For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” —Jeremiah 31:34
He forgave me and forgot all that had come before.
“… I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” —John 10:10
And He gave me life abundant.
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“For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you…” —John 13:15
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“Whoever recieves one such child in my name recieves me.” Matthew —18:5
What exactly is heaven? Where is it? When did it start? Will it really last for ever; and if so, just how long is that, anway? What makes it heaven?
Before Christ came into my life, all of my pursuit of Him was really me chasing a heaven of my imagination- and I basically thought that that was what the Christian life is. There have been so many questions that have come into my heart these past several months as I look around in awe at what it is really like. I find that being a Christian isn’t like I thought being a Christian would be (no! for being a Christian means being with the REAL Christ, not the hollow, uncaring Christ of my imagination!), and with that come so many other things which I find to be so different. For instance, heaven. I guess if being a Christian isn’t quite like I thought being a Christian would be, heaven just might not be exactly what I was expecting either. And I’ve found that it is not.
Let me start by decribing to you the heaven which unbelieving Ellen was pursuing:
It was a big place… I didn’t ever really visualize what it looked like, but it was certainly pleasant. I guess although the idea was really appealing to me, my main thought was not of the “golden castle” idea of heaven, because that was not what I was most hoping for. Not castles. The most prominite picture in my mind was the idea of having every thing go “my way”-I just I had a vague thought of finally being ‘in charge’ of what happened to me in some way. I was chasing a dream of a place where everything happened the way I wanted it to. My second thought of heaven was as a quiet spot where I could sit in a rocking chair & finally hold my Abigail again. I wanted to go to heaven (1) because I knew that hell was real in some way & didn’t want to go there; (2) because I wanted to finally be in a place where (as I thought) I might be able to make things go how I wanted them to go; (3) because I had (and still have) an intense longing to see the sister I never got to know, just once more. Always in my imagining of heaven Abby was there, just me & her. Abby was what made it heaven in my mind- in all ways it was much as this world is, except that Abigail was there, and dying was not real. I thought heaven was heaven because Abigail was there & bitter death was not.
But that is not why heaven is heaven. I find now that heaven is heaven because of Christ. Now that I know Him, I know that it could not possibly be heaven without Him. He is what is lovely about it. Not the gold & silver, no! Not the freedom from death- Christ, Christ is why it is heaven, I see now what I did not see before. Heaven is a place where we will at last be so free from sin that our released spirits will finally be able to praise our Saviour without check or bound; a place where the grief and hurt and pain that cuts us here will not come & sting any longer; a place where death that chases us here will not be permitted to enter; a place where our awakened souls will join with so many other saints who have gone before in inceasantly singing the glory of our God; a place where we will finally be complete in Christ; a place where we will finally see Him face to face; a place where we can at last sit in His holy presence forever & ever.
I am still exploring the meaning of heaven & would be a fool to try & expound further. With every new truth I dicover of our Home, the longing grows keener. The thought of going there grows sweeter in my heart with every changing tide of life, as I find that less & less of my own is here on earth. Every day as my understanding of heaven is growing deeper & I am finding that it is nothing like I thought it would be, that it is so much more beautiful than I thougth it would be- I find that I must be careful that my goal does not once again become heaven, but that my goal be now & always my only Christ. I must constantly remind myself as I strive to press daily toward my resting place where I can be with Him at last, that He is not absent from us who still trek the road to our Home. He is with us all along the road which we travel. He has not left His children to sojourn alone in this land. We can know Him here. He is with us here. We can praise Him here. We are His here.
Now I will leave you with some quotes from three of my favourite tools in discovering the truths of heaven: the Holy Scriptures, Samuel Rutherford, and Rich Mullins:
“Whom have I in Heaven but Thee?” Psalm 73.25
“He that cometh from above is above all: he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaks of
the earth: he that comes from heaven is above all.” John 3.31
“He that believes on the Father has everlasting life…” John 3.36
“He that has the Son has life…” I John 5.12
“These things have I written to you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you might believe on the name of the Son of God.” John 5.13
“…That we might know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son
Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.” I John 5.20
“There is such a thing as Glory
And there are hints of it everywhere
And the hints are overwelming
And it’s scent is in the air
It’s more powerful than morning
Oh the morning can’t compare
With such a thing as glory…” Rich Mullins
“When I leave I want to go out like Elijah
With a whirlwind to fuel my chariot of fire
And when I look back on the stars
It’ll be like a candlelight in central park
And it won’t break my heart to say goodbye.” Rich Mullins
“They are not lost ot you who are laid up in Christ treasurury in heaven. At the ressurection you ye shall meet with them: there they are, sent before but not sent away. The Lord loveth you, who is homely to take and give, to borrow & lend.” Samuel Rutherford
“There is nothing but perfect garden flowers in heaven, and the greatest plenishing there is Christ” Samuel Rutherford
“God has made many fair flowers, but the fairest of them all is heaven and the flower of all flowers is Christ.” Samuel Rutherford
“We smell the smoke of this lower house of the earth, because our heart and our thoughts are here. If we could mount up with God, we should smell of heaven and of our country above, and like strangers or people not born or brought up here-away. Our crosses would not bite upon us, if we were Heavenly minded.” Samuel Rutherford
“The sea-sick passenger shall come to land; Christ will be the first that will meet you on the shore” Samuel Rutherford
“Christ has come, and run away to heaven with my heart and my love, so that neither heart nor love is mine.” Samuel Rutherford
“Go on and faint not, something of yours is in heaven, beside the flesh of your exalted Saviour, and ye go on after your own.” Samuel Rutherford
It is not an imaginary place where fairy-angels dance in piles of gold. It is a real place. Real people I love are there right now. Abigail is there. My great grandmother Angeline is there. Even as we still daily have to remind ourselves that she is no longer here, Mrs Amber is there. It is amzing to imagine for a moment how different it must be for her than for us who are left behind for a little while longer. We know that they are expiriencing a greater reality than we could ever begin to get a hint of down here in the play world. Press on, press on toward heaven & Christ, do not look back on this old, cold, dirty playhouse, unless it be to grab by the hand some poor other, by such encouraging them to loosen their hold of the things of earth in a greater quest for things eternal. “What may I say of Him? Let us come & see.”
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