life: acoustic & amplified
poetry, quotes & thoughts about life
Archive for the category “inspiration”
I Surrender All
When we pray for God our shepherd to lead us, we usually have green pastures in mind. But when Peter and James healed a paralytic, preached to the crowd, and testified to the authorities who arrested them, they didn’t do this out of their own personal desire; they did it because God led them to. God didn’t exactly lead them beside still waters.
Our lives are richest in blessing, peace and vibrancy when we live not according to our own impulses, but in harmony with God’s grace. Whether it is toward peaceful rest or challenging action, God leads us from within, guiding, nudging, sometimes compelling us, and leads us from without, alluring, beckoning, pleading, needing us. We much prefer going our own way, of course―so we do what we can to ignore God’s shepherding. One way is to believe that God is on our side, so that we don’t feel the need to listen to God. We already know. Another way is to limit our faith to ideas, so that we can “believe” without actually acting. Another escape is to be busy, so that we believe we can’t afford to slow down as much as is needed to listen to God. Many believers are so sure and busy that if God really is a shepherd, they’re atheists.
You will not likely know God’s will for your life by pushing hard. You’re more likely to find out by listening for the voice of your shepherd and following. Whether you feel the need to stand up and act or lie down and rest, let God shepherd you. Let the Spirit within you and in others speak to you. Let God’s “rod and staff” gently lead you. Rather than deciding where you ought to be, discern where your shepherd is, and be there. Renounce all your ideas of where God ought to lead you. Let the shepherd decide. In stillness, listen. In openness, wait to hear. In humble trust, resolve to follow the shepherd before you know where he’s going.
Don’t resist when the shepherd leads you either to pastures greener than you think you deserve or valleys darker than you think you can handle. If you are with your shepherd, you are in the right place. You are in “the house of the Lord.” Listen, trust and follow. And don’t worry about saving the world. That’s God’s job. Neither shrink back in despair nor run ahead on your own; just stay with the shepherd. Just show up and take your place in the flock, where God needs you. Surely goodness and mercy will follow you all the days of your life.
_____________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
Used with permission
The Only Song
Oh God, I bless thee for the happy moment
when I first saw thy law fulfilled in Christ,
wrath appeased, death destroyed, sin forgiven,
my soul saved….
I want no other rock to build upon than that I have,
desire no other hope than that of gospel truth,
need no other look than that which gazes
on the cross…
May my cry be always, Only Jesus! only Jesus!
In Him I have all that I can hold;
enlarge me to take in more…
If I am tempted, and have no wit,
give me strength enough to trust in Him…
If in extremity,
let me feel that He can deliver me;
If driven to the verge of hope
and to the pit of despair,
grant me grace to fall into His arms.
O God, hear me,
do for me more
than I ask, think, or dream.”
~ excerpted from Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions blogged April 24, 2012 on http://www.aholyexperience.com/
THE ONLY SONG Lyrics
I see the choir in the robes, the piano player plays
And they all sing hallelujah
All the people in the front and the people in the back
Are singing praises to Ya
And I close my eyes and let the music wash right over me
Just like the blood of the lamb that washed me clean
I’m looking through the book at the hymns
That a thousand men have written for You
“Amazing Grace” and “I’ll Fly Away”
And “Joyful We Adore You”
And it occurred to me that the songs I sing, although they’re beautiful
They just don’t compare to the best one that I know
You are the melody, the words, You’re the chorus
Cause You gladly laid Your life down for us
All the blessings that You bring
You’re the only song I ever wanna sing.
All the sinners and the saints got something to say
But we know who gave ’em voices
And we’re all down here in the atmosphere just making joyful noises
Birds are singing in the air, thunder crashes like a drum
Your song is everywhere; it was my first number 1
You are the melody the words, You’re the chorus
Cause You gladly laid Your life down for us
All the blessings that You bring
You’re the only song I ever wanna sing.
Sing Halleluja
Hallelujah
Sing Hallelujah
Hallelujah
You are the melody, the words, You’re the chorus
Cause You gladly laid your life down for us
You are the melody, the words, You’re the chorus
Cause You gladly laid Your life down for us
All the blessings that You bring
Lord of Lords, and King of Kings
We will let our voices ring
You’re the only song we ever wanna sing.
You’re the only song I ever wanna sing (hallelujah)
You’re the only song I ever wanna sing (hallelujah)
You’re the only song I ever wanna sing.
Love Conquers All
Sonnet 116:
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
by William Shakespeare
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error, and upon me prov’d,
I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.
Public domain
Get great poetry daily from The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor
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Defining Love
Posted Friday, April 23, 2012 by Women of Faith
Love is difficult to define. It is one of those intangibles—something we cannot touch, taste, see, hear, or smell. Still, we do try. The dictionary defines love as an intense emotional attachment. For many of us, love is just that—a feeling we have—and feelings can be very hard to put into words. It doesn’t simplify matters to define love by saying that God is love, because we can’t really define Him either. But think about it for a minute. God says, “I am God. I am love. These are My people and I love them. How have I behaved towards those I love? See, this is what love expects, how love reacts, what love is willing to do. This is love.” It may not help us to slap a nice, tidy definition on love, but it does help us to understand what love is supposed to look like.
This week, stretch your mind and heart a bit as you try to comprehend the bigness of God’s love for you. Do you have a view of the ocean where you live? God’s love is much more vast and deep! Do you have mountains to admire? God’s love is higher than they are! Do you live in wide open places—”big sky country”? God’s love stretches beyond those horizons! Are you blessed with a view of the night sky, with all its stars? The love of God for you is higher even than these! Take comfort and confidence in the unchanging faithfulness of God’s love. Give thanks for the gentleness of God’s love. Pray that you will be able to receive God’s love, for that is just the thing your heart needs today.
Excerpted from Receiving God’s Love. Copyright 2005 Thomas Nelson, Inc. Published by Thomas Nelson.
http://www.womenoffaith.com/
We are the body – use all your gifts!!!
Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms. – I Peter 4:10 NIV
During your times of ‘active waiting’ keep your eyes and heart open for God!!!
The greatest discovery of all time is that a person
can change his future by merely changing his attitude.
– Oprah Winfrey
The many contradictions in our lives – such as being home while feeling homeless, being busy while feeling bored, being popular while feeling lonely, being believers while feeling many doubts – can frustrate, irritate, and even discourage us. They make us feel that we are never fully present. Every door that opens for us makes us see how many more doors are closed.
But there is another response. These same contradictions can bring us into touch with a deeper longing, for the fulfillment of a desire that lives beneath all desires and that only God can satisfy. Contradictions, thus understood, create the friction that can help us move toward God.
Henri Nouwen
http://www.henrinouwen.org/
Look for the miracles and the openings!!!
life: acoustic & amplified 