It is Fitting …

Monday, January 17, 2022

Moonset,

Waiting for Sunrise,

Trusting God’s Gifts,

Singing God’s Praise

As It Is Fitting!

Psalm 147:1

Praise the Lord! How good it is to sing praises to our God; for he is gracious, and a song of praise is fitting.

Ephesians 5:19

Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts.

Words of Grace For Today

Cell phones across the world produce pictures and videos at an astounding rate each day.

From Statista: “In 2021, the number of mobile devices operating worldwide stood at almost 15 billion….” https://www.statista.com/statistics/245501/multiple-mobile-device-ownership-worldwide/

This means that we have an overwhelming plethora of images of our world, manipulated to look better than reality by software written and rewritten by programmers … so much so that our imagination of what the world is has been bent, skewed, and perverted to such an extent that experiencing the real world has become extra-ordinary. Some find it marvellous to experience the real world. Others (those so disconnected from reality through their reliance on digital ‘connections’) find it outright daunting and even frightening.

The music of the spheres, as it was named centuries ago, plays through the universe, from the deepest points in space to the tiniest piece of creation on earth …

and

we are privileged to be able to sing along

with

wondrous praise

for the Creator of this magnificent creation

in which we were created to live, flourish, love, hope, and find connection with each other and with creation.

A great photo (in comparison to a snapshot or picture or video) uses all the tools at hand (in the camera and available to the photographer) and

imagines

the wonders that can be produced from a particular perspective of creation,

in order to create (as God made us able to be creative, not mere tools manipulated by software)

an image that speaks volumes

(of praise)

about

the Creator, us creatures, and this amazing planet we live on (and some of us are so privileged to have shelter to call home on.)

So we sing songs of praise that are fitting to the gifts God gives us, and we sing and make melody to the Lord in our hearts.

What will we do this day with all God’s gifts?

Will we selfishly destroy and destory other people’s connection to reality in order that we can ‘get ahead’ or

will we sing God’s praises?

What will you do this day with all God’s gifts?

Will you selfishly destroy and destory other people’s connection to reality in order that you can ‘get ahead’ or

will you sing God’s praises?

Choose as you will, but as for me and mine, we will serve the Lord, and sing and sing and sing God’s praises in our hearts and in all we do each day, as God makes us saints able.

Life, Love, & Hope

Sunday, January 16, 2022

In the Darkest Times

The Light of Christ

Brings Us Breath,

Love,

and

Hope!

Psalm 105:4

Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually.

Luke 11:10

For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

Words of Grace For Today

There are many ways to celebrate God’s presence in our lives on the holy day of rest, and none more appropriate than to spend the day seeking the Lord,

as it is so appropriate on all good days,

and all bad days.

The promise is clear, better than anything else in all of life.

For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

On our good days the promise that we will receive, find, and have doors opened for us, when we ask, search, and knock, this promise is wonderful!

On our bad days these promises are essential to life. They give us breath, life, and hope … enough so that we live another day to …

fear, love, and serve the Lord.

It doesn’t get better than that.

At Great Cost We Are Healed

Saturday, January 15, 2022

We Find Our Way

No Matter the Challenges

Since Jesus Himself

Makes Us

Whole

Isaiah 53:5

He was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed.

2 Corinthians 5:21

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Words of Grace For Today

We can of course try really hard to make things right, for ourselves, and for others if we are so inclined to care, though I’ve met some people as I’m sure you have, who do not want to make it right for others at all, not at all. They make it as bad for others as they can, with lies, corruption, and false convictions.

Our efforts to make it right are simply not enough, not ever. We cannot make it right, not right enough, no matter how hard we try. God help us,

literally, for there simply is no other way to make it right, not right enough.

Jesus, though, has already made it right, very right, more than right, for Jesus makes everything right for us with God, and then …

then everything is right for us.

And those people who want to do us as much destruction as possible are kept far enough away that we are safe, as safe as ever, as safe as ever.

For our sake God made Jesus to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

So we are healed and made whole, for yet another day, another way, another life given to us again, though we certainly do not deserve it. So it is by Grace another gift of life, love and hope …

at great cost to Jesus.

Innocents Project Here?

Friday, January 14, 2022

Like Fog Rising From the Cold Frozen Lake Ice,

Made All That More Visible by the Wonderful Light,

So May the Light of Christ Make Obvious

the Fog of Evil and False Convictions

That Abound, Also Here!

Psalm 126:3

The Lord has done great things for us, and we rejoiced.

Ephesians 1:3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

Words of Grace For Today

Every day the only way to survive, after the evil that has been focused on me to bring about my undeserved destruction, is to remember that the Lord has done great things for me, and I rejoice!

Fridays, we remember all those people who are falsely accused, harassed by the police soliciting false reports about them, fabricating evidence, and falsely convicted by judges who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! (Isaiah 5:20) We especially pray for men who are falsely accused by their spouse or partner, for there seems to be no end to the false charges and convictions based on obvious lies by women about good, honest men.

We pray that the Light of Christ will come to bear on each false conviction and those that brought it to be, that God’s justice will come to be for the falsely convicted and come down on all those that contributed to the false conviction and the destruction of their lives.

We pray, that as it is for me it will be for all those falsely convicted: that God has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. And that those heavenly places will be where we are now on this planet earth.

Travellers, All

Wednesday, January 12, 2022

Where Ever Our Paths Take Us.

Hold Us In Your Hands.

Jeremiah 10:10

The Lord is the true God; he is the living God and the everlasting King. At his wrath the earth quakes, and the nations cannot endure his indignation.

Matthew 11:25

At that time Jesus said, ‘I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants.

Words of Grace For Today

We all have places to go, if not that we actually go, then places to which we wish we could go.

Some of us dream of seeing the greatest man-made wonders: the great wall of China, the pyramids in Egypt, and in space the ISS. Or the wondrous features of earth: Siberia’s expanses, the ice shelves of Antarctica, the tundras of north Canada, the Grand Canyon, or … we each have our own list.

Many of us, though, have lesser places to go. Some of us must go on regular trips for business or family, and others of us have options to go places (or we wish we had the option.)

As we travel and others travel, we remember how powerful God is, that at God’s wrath the earth quakes. We remember that the greatest truths of God’s creation God does not reveal to the people who proclaim themselves ‘wise and intelligent’. Rather God reveals the greatest truths to the supposed ‘infants’ of this earth, the supposed ‘foolish’, ‘guilty’, and ‘outsiders’.

Today we remember all these travellers, supposed wise and God’s own children, and pray that God will accompany each traveller, on the way there, and on the way back, so that all travellers will live well before and after each trip that must be, and each trip that we choose to make.

We, also, pray that together we will remember how our trips cost the earth in CO emissions, and all of us a bit of our future, and a bit more for our future generations.

God, be merciful to us, as we poison the very earth you created for us to live on, as we travel to and fro.

The Way of the World

Tuesday, January 11, 2022

The Sky Remembers

With the Colour of Honour

The Blood of All

The Men Abused

and Many Who Were Killed

Ecclesiastes 5:6

Do not let your mouth lead you into sin, and do not say before the messenger that it was a mistake; why should God be angry at your words, and destroy the work of your hands?

Colossians 2:18

Do not let anyone disqualify you, insisting on self-abasement and worship of angels, dwelling on visions, puffed up without cause by a human way of thinking.

Words of Grace For Today

Sunday rest.

Monday work and remember the children.

Tuesday work and remember all the men who are abused by women.

Oh, you say, that is not how the world is. Men abuse women and kill them.

Yes, we’ve come a long way recognizing how some men, very few men, abuse women with violence that eventually and inevitably leads to the man violently killing the woman, or psychological demeaning until the woman feels so worthless that she kills herself. And we have recognized the signs, and coaxed and coached abuse women away from their abuser (which is very hard to do since the abuser’s abuse captures and makes the abused think she needs the abuser’s presence and approval), and provided safe places for abused women to recover their sense of self, their voice, and their assurance of their own worth … and a vision of life without the abuser.

And many women and men have gone beyond that to assume and punish all men for the abuse done by a few, which only turns the tables on the men. Now the women and men become ardent, unrelenting, unabashed misandrists, theirs is the destruction of innocent, good people (men), and the lies that are told about innocent men mushroom into a cloud over society from which no one can escape.

Meanwhile many men are caught in their abuser’s trap, just as women are also. They have lost their voice, their woman has robbed them of their sense of self, of all their friends, of all contact with reality as they are blamed for so many things each day, small at first, the huge things, that the man has had nothing to do with. And the end is the same as for women: some women abusers are violent and they eventually, inevitably kill the abused man who is so worthless she sees him as not even human. More women psychologically beat the voice, worth, and hope right out of the man until he withers into self-loathing and finds no way to go on, so he kills himself. Men with a even a small tendency for violence use a gun, those with none use other means like poison.

When the courts are involved, like the rest of society, there are precious few who even think it’s possible for a woman to abuse a man if the woman is not beating the living daylights out of the man, and even then they are more likely to charge and convict the man – even though it is the woman violently beating up the man, and the man only tries to save his life. When the abuse is psychologial the courts most likely convict the man of come kind of harassment or psychological abuse (even though it’s the woman who is the abuser, if they would only open their eyes to the possibility!)

The rest of society is not unlike the courts, blaming the man for being abused: ‘what kind of a man are you to let a woman treat you like that!’ ‘No real man could ever be abused by a woman. Look at her. She’s half a foot shorter, and 50 pounds lighter (though so much stronger physically, if they’d only look.)’ ‘You’re not a real human if you let her treat you like that. You must have it coming. You’ve done something terrible to her.’ ‘Hey, man, it’s your fault for staying with her. Anyone with sense would have left long ago.’ And so go the blaming of the man for the woman’s abuse.

In the end everyone loses, no one more than the children, who learn to lie to protect themselves, who learn that courts and cops and church people are all corrupt, who learn never to tell the real truth about who is doing what to whom, because they will be made to pay if they do.

So we remember Tuesdays all the men abused by women.

And we pray that we will not be led astray by our words or others’ words of deceit.

And we pray that we will not be caught up in the ‘human way of thinking’ so that we ignore men who are suffering, and whose suffering will always end in death … unless someone or some miracle intervenes.

So Crooked Are We

Monday, January 10, 2022

God Creates All That is Beautiful

and

That Includes All That is Crooked,

We Pray That God Will

Straighten Us and Our Enemies Out

Before It’s Too Late.

Psalm 19:13

Keep back your servant also from the insolent; do not let them have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

1 Corinthians 4:5

Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive commendation from God.

Words of Grace For Today

There are so many ways to ruin one’s own life, and the life of those around one, so many ways.

We pray that God will save us from these many ways,

and that we will trust God’s forgiveness each of the many times we still mess up lives, and

that we will trust God’s forgiveness for each of the many times each other person messes up lives, even our life.

That is difficult to do, when those that mess up one’s life do it with great authority and clear intention and dark guile.

That is even more difficult to do when the lives the others mess up are the children’s lives, especially when it is done with great authority and clear intention and dark guile.

Therefore we pray that God will help us not become insolent, or judgmental, or arrogant, or … well there are so many ways to be that will lead us to ignore God’s Grace.

So we pray, each day, that we will rely on God’s Grace to guide us, especially as we deal with those who would mess up our lives and the lives of the children … and

that children so messed with, will come to know and trust God’s generous Grace and steadfast love for them and for all people.

We have done our work, sacrificed all that we have, in order to protect the children, and those with great authority and clear intention and dark guile have brought our efforts and sacrifice to naught.

Now all that is left is to trust God’s Spirit to find a way to show the children a life that is filled with Grace, forgiveness, love, and hope; a life that is not fully dependent on money, power, or fame; a life that depends only on God’s will for us.

Today, there is work to do. God’s work to bring Grace, forgiveness, love and hope to bear on so many lives that are lived so foreign to all goodness from God.

Father and Mother, What is Special About This …

Sunday, January 9, 2022

Only A Moose Makes Tracks

Across the -30⁰ and Colder Lake,

While We Remember What We Have Heard

Of God’s Word.

What is special, is that we remember how God ….

Isaiah 31:1

Alas for those who go down to Egypt for help and who rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or consult the Lord!

Hebrews 2:1

Therefore we must pay greater attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it.

Words of Grace For Today

Rest.

Today instead of looking to ‘Egypt of might and horses many and chariots strong’, not even when these things of might, many and strength in our lives are carried by so many and various ways of working, of securing money, favour, and power, of being our own people, today

yes

today

we rest.

We rest in the Promises of God,

The Gifts of God,

The Saints of God,

The Forgiveness of God,

The Grace of God,

The Generosity of God,

The Love of God,

The Faith given to us by God,

and

The hope, that

that all things will be well, all things will be well, all manner of things will be well,

because,

All manner of things are already, today, by God’s Word that Creates, Sustains, and Renews,

by God’s Will, all things are already today well, quite well,

quite well indeed.

Faith, Hope … and Life Now!

Saturday, January 8, 2022

Tracks Lead Us To Places Unknown

Always We Walk Not Alone,

for God Walks with Us.

Job 16:19

Even now, in fact, my witness is in heaven, and he that vouches for me is on high.

Hebrews 11:1

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Words of Grace For Today

It’s a quiet day ahead, for a cold winter Saturday, following many cold, cold days …

and not a little frustration with people who live by full disregard for truth, and who seek my death, sooner than later, but slowly so the suffering continues and they can be pleased with their sadistic efforts. It’s one thing to have one’s ex after you, it’s another to have the courts helping her. There is always more injustice than justice, more evil than good, and more death of good people (and not enough of evil people?)

How to remain hopeful that the future will be better?

Well, that is actually a futilely placed question,

for one cannot hope that the future will be better.

The only thing one can do is live well in the present, in the face of evil to be gracious and good. In the face of those who wish one dead, to live joyously.

The moments are not rare when the spectacular works of God can be seen here and now, they require only that one has ears to hear and eyes to see … and hearts to celebrate life with gratitude.

We have faith and hold to it as the future moves into the present and then the past. That faith is not something we conjure up or make or assemble … no in any way.

Faith is a gift … a gift freely given by God to us. Therefore it will never fail, nor succumb to evil of any kind or quantity.

Facing evil, God vouches for us saints, and there is no surer witness. More we do not need.

Therefore we see the future, not as something that need be better, but rather as more of the present gifts God gives us: that we are vouched for, and we can live gracious and gratefully and generously …

in this present moment

each moment

of each day, even today.

Cold Hard Truth

Friday, January 7, 2022

It May Look Soft and Comfy

Easy Light and Curves Shown by Shadows

But It’s Already -41⁰ at 18:00

So It’s Hard Cold

And Was Even as the Sun Set Golden Light All Over the Snow.

God is Exactly the Opposite:

Appearing Hard and Judging All,

God is Actually Gracious and Generous For All.

Deuteronomy 4:39

So acknowledge today and take to heart that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.

Colossians 1:19-20

For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

Words of Grace For Today

The all in one package of God

Three in One, yet all One.

Acknowledge God and take it to heart that God is God. Simple

and

yet

So impossible

for us frail, sinful humans.

The real nugget in all that we can say about God is that Jesus is God’s clear statement that God is pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

Jesus’ story is not God making a special appeal to special people.

Jesus’ story is God making a very demonstrable appeal to all humans of all time: God wants to reconcile us all to God, no one is left out.

When God is pleased to do something so gracious and generous for all people, all people being so equally undeserving, then this is something truly awesome. It changes everything we thought we might have known about how life works.

We get to respond.

So do we respond by lying about others, framing them for our own sins and failings? Do we hide behind lies told by others, and corrupt practices, and the corruption of people in high places?

OR

Do we start to exercise God’s grace and generosity for ourselves and for all other people?