When my heart is overwhelmed!

I guess the fact that I almost died seven years ago and the thin line between acceptance and rejoicing that that didn't happen took a hold of me. God's worship is the place where I can cry out to Him.
It was interesting to me that the infinite Holy Spirit can also be grieved. I saw the progression of grief and grieving in my own soul and the parallel with how the Spirit has dealt with His Church through Church History. I call this the "death of Athenasius" The first step was the acceptance and love of the Holy Spirit in Worship. Like a young couple, spontaneous worship donns the communion of God's people. Then, we grieve Him. What will we do? So often, we replace the spontaneous worship of God with instructions. We make people do what the Holy Spirit makes them do. Stand and worship Him. We command and then we instruct and then we implore and then the silence of death is left, because we have gotten comfortable, with our sins. Carrying the grieving of the Holy Spirit into our worship. God, cleanse us and help us know the spontanaity of alive worship and the Love that God who enters into the worship of His loving people. Death of worship is allowing other generations alone to pen the works of the Lord. We have no new words, like the dictionary in Latin the canon of hymns is closed, because we have grieved the Holy Spirit and tell God what we will say to Him.
Enliven our worship and comfort our hearts to know that You are owning our worship. We love You Lord and we would worship in Spirit and in Truth.

A consideration of the blinding power of grief.

Grief and loss are a blinding power. I do know this first hand. I am never so blind to the goodness of God or senseless of His comforts, as when paralyzed in my grief. When I even look in the direction of grief, it is as though a deerlike paralasis, as when a car's lights have it in sway, comes over me and I am stuck careening into its abyss. The best advice that I have found for such an emotional and spiritual weight and distress, has been from Pastor Martin. He said look at all of the things that happen, through the cross. As though the cross were stamped upon your eyes. Christ’s sacrifice is the only thing that makes sense, until the by and by and until the emotional sickness of grief is past or strengthened.

That is the only thing that makes sense in blinding grief, is that Jesus paid it all for my soul. Everything else is blurry under the weights of grief.
I love, Melody Green’s song, Do I trust You? That is always the question. Am I going to be one of those who trust You under the weight of pain of loss. Hold on to the unchanging hand of Jesus. He is holding tight to my hand when my eyes are swollen from the tears and my strength is gone from trying to trust.

Do I trust You? I can’t relate to these people who only know of the victorious chants of everything being in their favor. I praise God, in spite of His piercing providences. The sacrifice of praise glorifies God, as well as the praise in goodly circumstances. The difference between a human relationship with God and an angelic relationship, they never have their wills gone against, those angels, which are God’s.
We have the experience of being disappointed by God’s providences and still having to love and trust Him, even in our disappointments.

Having the will to love and trust and praise Him, when our hearts and minds are full of questions of His love and care. Having to trust what He has said when everything looks bleak is a human relationship with God. That is the mutuality that God intended in the making of man in His own image. As mutual as one can get to mutual with a supreme and fully sovereign being. In Christ we have the ability to converse and hear from God and learn to love Him, even, in the “fellowship of suffering” there is only looking at the difficulty of 9-11 through the lens of the cross of Christ. Are You Good, Lord, when suffering comes to my city, to my neighbors and to me? The demons always say no. The angels always say yes. They see the heavenly perspective. It is intensely human to question and seek the Lord’s face and will in suffering. We are not robots and God didn’t want that. Thy face, o Lord will I seek, was the sentiment of David that made him a man after God’s own heart. Are You good, when I am in distress, Lord? David didn’t say yes or no, he said let me see. I am seeking Your face in this, Dear Lord, show Yourself strong. Show Yourself, loving. Show Yourself, longsuffering. Show Yourself, who You are. That is the example of the difference between faith and unbelief. Unbelief, justifies self, in the face of God. I am…good? I am…great? Taking on the justification of self.

What is grace for? Surely we will learn what grace is for, as we sail to heaven’s shores. Pastor Martin was the only Pastor that I heard say that we will fight and struggle, with sometimes little to show for our labors, if would make heaven our aim. He is the only one who had a comfort for me in the loss of all dear ones in some season or other, though he didn’t have a clue that those encouragements were for me. God is our Heavenly Coach and He is more interested in drawing out growth than in maintaining the status quo. The greater our responsibility the more that we will stumble and weep and struggle over our ailments of soul. God, please give me grace to stand for You, amidst my responsibilities. The more children? The more relatives? The more advantage, the more gains, the more money, the more influence…etc. God has people in every sphere who are being called to live for Him. Can I live for Him in the job that I have? Can I live for Him with the amount of responsibility that I have. Seek my Face is God’s invitation. Your Face, O Lord will I seek should be our answer. I can’t see how God could use me to live for Him, in my responsibility. That is everybody’s answer. Anybody who can see the whole way on, is lying. Can I live in communion with Christ, in my family, with my life and the mess that I am living in and the consequences of the life that I am sowing. Seek My Face is the answer God gives. Your Face will I seek. Seeking wisdom, where wisdom is needed, seeking guidance, where guidance is needed. Seeking patience and the fruit of the Spirit where needed. The devil says, You can’t do it. You might as well give it up. Satan, get thee behind me. 5 bleeding wounds He bears, received on Calvary, they pour effectual prayers, they strongly plead for me.
My conscience must be cleansed by the blood of Jesus. I must live in the light and communion with God, in the light of His efficacious sacrifice. Cry and weep, the loss was very great for us on 9-11. Generations before put their grief into movies and poems and songs. We are speechless. God is good, even when we look at our grief in the face and can’t see past the smoke and the soot. Help us Lord, to clean up our world and give it to our children better, safer, more considerate, or, at the very least, more conscious of sin and salvation through Christ. We are not omnipotent. But we can be conscientious, caring, thoughtful, courageous, prayerful, consistent and God-fearing people. That doesn’t mean that we have to look like wierdos, just regular people whose tears flow, when the numbers 9-11 come on the screen. Who will never live to see a day when we pray that that plane isn’t going to crash. Who try to do what we can to trust God with what is left to us of time and strength. Who fear God and try to do right.

Storms may rise on seas unknown
While we journey towards our home
Surely we'll learn what grace if for
As we sail to heaven's shore

Send us strength O pilgrim guide
Sin would drown us in its tide
Be close at hand and go before
As we sail to heaven's shore

Holy Spirit lead us on
Give us courage bring the song

Lord we trust Your Father's care
Will convey us safely there
Open or seal off every door
As we sail to heaven's shore

Straighten our course with every prayer
Let heaven's breezes speed us there
And grant us mercy evermore
As we sail to heaven's shore

Draw us near O finest Friend
From dawn's light to evening's end
Each passing day we love You more
As we sail to heaven's shore
As we sail to heaven's shore

The Center of the Worship Service is Worship!

Worship is to God! Worship is for God. God speaks to us in worship. God deigns to own our worship, if He would, but the center of worship is not preaching, it is worship. Preaching is when we look to God, in worship. But we ascribe glory to God in singing and reading and prayer and all of that together is worship. "The Spirit and the Bride say...Come!" Them that come to God must believe that He is and is the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. Seeking Him, will have some great portion of receiving preaching, but it will first be giving Him the glory. We sometimes think that our contribution is the greatest, when we are, either the "singer" or the "preacher". Neither is preeminent. Worship, is the greatest portion of worship. The Father seeks such to worship Him in spirit and in truth. God grant us eyes to see that when we ascribe the glory to You and receive Your ownership of our worship and fellowship with us; as we give or render worship to God, we will be transformed from our self-serving attitude to an attitude that wants to please You and not just do what is comfortable to our flesh.
What shall I render, unto God for all of His benefits...I will take the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. Halleluia what a Savior!

...On earth, as it is in Heaven?--"Help us Lord!"

That does mean order. I am not always consistently under authority to my husband as I ought. Nor, am I able to order my ways, even just under my own schedule, but that is what I pray for, in the Lord's prayer. Help me Lord to make my children go to bed and do their homework and do the thing necessary in a timely and wise fashion. Help me to look at how You do things when I am making my schedule and process those things in the right priority. Help me not to let a disgruntled attitude get me so out of sorts that I can't lay the law down with the children and myself. This is the Lord's Prayer that I pray.

Our Father, who art in Heaven! A link to Mt.6;9

I am blessed at the meditation of God being our Heavenly Father. We worship God, who is infinitely above us in wisdom and power and glory and yet, condescended to purchase our sonship and daughtership with Him. What an amazing love that is! How can You be so above us and want to be our Father? How can You pay so huge a price for something so seemingly minute to us?
How important is the relationship of parenting to God, if He would send the beloved Son of His Bosom to pay for an adoption for reprobates? Thank God for redemption.
Truly Hallowed, is His name.

The Holy Spirit speaks to my heart, this morning, that these words that we say, nearly thoughtlessly, contain the most important truth in the universe. God loves us, enough to want to be called Our Father. God loves us enough to teach us to call Him, Our Father. God paid it all for this to become so, in Christ. Halleluia!

Matthew6:9

The Scriptures allow us to watch what makes a grown man cry.

2 Samuel 1: 19"The beauty of Israel is slain on your high places! How the mighty have fallen! 20 Tell it not in Gath, Proclaim it not in the streets of Ashkelon-- Lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice, Lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph. 21 "O mountains of Gilboa, Let there be no dew nor rain upon you, Nor fields of offerings. For the shield of the mighty is cast away there! The shield of Saul, not anointed with oil. 22 From the blood of the slain, From the fat of the mighty, The bow of Jonathan did not turn back, And the sword of Saul did not return empty. 23 "Saul and Jonathan were beloved and pleasant in their lives, And in their death they were not divided; They were swifter than eagles, They were stronger than lions. 24 "O daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, Who clothed you in scarlet, with luxury; Who put ornaments of gold on your apparel. 25 "How the mighty have fallen in the midst of the battle! Jonathan was slain in your high places. 26 I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan; You have been very pleasant to me; Your love to me was wonderful, Surpassing the love of women. 27 "How the mighty have fallen, And the weapons of war perished!"

I do love the faith that makes David weep aloud and yet with hope in the most High God that comforts will come. God allows us a peek into the heart of a man with humble love for God and those around him. In a large family, our hearts can become calloused to love and aloof from real relationships. Like riches, family has a way of insulating you from outside and real relationships. The fact that we do not read of David's grief for other family members, in scripture and that God allows us to see the love that penned this lament makes me try to translate some of the sentiments that I see in him to my own mind.
Perhaps they are jaded with my own experiences of loss, and being a woman, but it helps me to think that God is teaching us to continue to love, in spite of loss.

David's lament for Jonathan.

Can I say how I have loved my brother? My heart is broken, broken. The world must know. The sky is dark and the streets are empty for my beloved brother has left this earth. We laughed and cried and hoped together. It does seem too soon, I cry. I loved my brother, I cannot think of anything that I loved better than that. To see that father and son team in extravagant embraces, was beyond the reach of my earthly relationships. I loved Jonathan as a brother and he loved me as well. He is gone and my heart weeps aloud for the loss, from this earth. My heart would leap when I would see your face. There was little delight on earth but the safety of your friendship. Others have had ulterior motives and mocking glances, but never Jonathan. Others have been fans or onlookers, but, never Jonathan. He saw through the facades. He loved in the realm of earth. Where it cost him dearly. He loved me whether the earth approved or not. I loved him whether life allowed or not. I had thought that we would see these days together and dandle our children and affect Israel together. I had thought that one more time, I would be comforted in the glance and embrace of my brother. I had thought that war would have spared me my one treasure. The love and delight of my heart. I am broken at the thought of going on into the future, without that love to comfort me. Father and mother aside and apart, God has given me the comfort of one true friend. One true love, one true brother and I will ever remember that God was faithful to delight my soul with this. Everyone should be crying because the world was a more royal and beautiful place, with the regal and magnificence that Saul allowed us to enjoy. Everyone should be mourning for we have all lost heroes and mighty ones in the battle. But I above all. I lost hero and king. I lost friend and enemy and family. But more, I have lost the closest brother and friend that I had in the world. I have known that God would comfort me in all of my distresses. I have known that the darkest valleys, God embraces and comforts me. Comfort me, in this dark valley, Lord. God, give hope and help and restore my heart from the pieces that it collapses from, this day. My dearest one is gone. My brother is lost. My love feels bereft.

an imaginary letter from Jonathan to David, found after his passing


(Aug 11, 2005)
The death of Jonathan, eternally the loving friend of David!

My dearest David,

The battle has been especially fierce lately and although my courage is high, fear is just under the surface, lately. I so long for those days when we were fighting shoulder to shoulder and fear seemed so far away. I had never before seen a man with such an abandonment to the will of God as you were in our youth. Golliath was immense and fierce and you were a little squirt and didn’t even flinch from fear as the rest of us.
I must confess that I never thought you’d succeed but when you did, you gained my unfailing devotion.
As a man, I thought there could never be one who would impress me in this life. In the freedom of faith and the love of God, you hurled the stone that callapsed 2 giants in my life, Golliath,one and my father, the other. I honor my father, but lived under the shame of my never living up to his expectations. His stinging and crushing dissappointment in me had become the giant of my life and with the blow of Golliath to the ground and the songs that spread of your fame, you helped me to see him as fallible and human. I will never be able to thank you enough for that.

I wanted you to become king! I love the spirit of God that empowered you in everything that you do. I know that it was God because of how it freed me! When we die in one of these battles, whether today or tomorrow, know that I had to stand next to you for just a moment of my life in order to feel strong. David has truly killed his 10,000’s and my support has always been for you. I love you more than I have ever loved anyone in my life and I am grateful to God to have had the privilege of loving you. I simply could never tell you how healing to my soul your love has been. Thank you!
Jon


Remember the day that you came into our house and we became close friends. I never imagined that we would live to see the day that my father would agree with me that you were golden. He really does agree with me now. When we were fighting today he said to me that this is the kind of battle you wish you had a Dave at your right hand. And I know that he meant that. We both love you. I wish that I could’ve lived to see your kingdom prosper and flourish as I am sure it will, but it is enough for me to have loved you. I hope that I have encouraged you a little in this life as you have me. You are a genuine friend. A man among men who introduced me to prayer and praise. I am still repeating that one that you showed me about Jehovah being my shepherd. Only you could have written that one. I didn’t mean to laugh when I read it, but it seemed funny that a poor little fellow could see Jehovah as being so very big in his life. I have had every luxury and my vision of Jehovah had been clouded by this sense of inadequacy and hopelessness. You made me see Jehovah as larger than my father and my love of Him has grown as my love of you has grown. Truly, I am like the little sheep that were in your care as a child and Jehovah has shepherded my soul in many valleys. My grief for your continued distance from our family has taken a toll on my body and soul and some days I cry from morning to night desiring some hymn of comfort, to which I had grown so accustomed. Jehovah comes, in spirit, to comfort me.
I do remember what a knack you have for rejoicing. I need some of that mirth right now. I wish you were here to tell me a joke. Gloom seems to be as thick as peanut butter. Why do the nations rage? You would say. These things don’t seem like they will pass. I long for peace. The losses are mounting and sometimes it gets to me. Knowing that Jehovah will collect our souls to the fathers is something that I learned from you. I still sing that little song in the morning that you sent for my birthday. Where shall we indeed go from His spirit? He is even here in the darkness of the sheol of war. With His hand he will indeed save me! I can find some comfort in that.
It seemed my greatest comfort to have had a hope to do my duty and die next to you in the battle. Jehovah has denied me that, but as I look into eternity with the hopes of the comforts of Abrahamic covenant, it seems that I will miss you even there. Earth has no sorrow, that heaven cannot cure. I do pray that God would be merciful to me, as you have… My soul trusts in the shadow of his wings and I know that He is the most high… I am looking to Him,to come from Heaven to save me; but it is very hard when the battle rages as it is. My soul also is among lions and those very ravenous and rejoicing, already over our souls. My heart is fixed, O God… I too, am trying to awaken my praise because the mercy of God is so great He is to be exalted above all the earth and even over the shame of this kind of a death…

I pray that you would find this with my belongings and know that we thought of you, even here.

The Star Spangled

The Star Spangled Banner
Oh say can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What, so proudly we hail, at the twilights last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars,
Through the barrenest night,
O’er the ramparts we watch, were so gallantly streaming,
And the rockets red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night, that our flag was still there.
Oh say, does that star spangled banner, yet wave?
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!

Oh Say, Does that Star Spangled Banner Yet Wave?

Is it still there? Are we still, the land of the free and the home of the brave?
There are 2 questions there. One, is the question of the banner waving. That is the easy part of the question. We can buy a flag. We can wave it high. We can dress in red white and blue and the flag is waving. We can be the flag, if we like and celebrate the independence of our nation.
But, is it waving over the land of the free and the home of the brave? That, indeed is a harder question.
That is a harder thing to impose and fight for in our nation. The land of the free and the home of the brave, means more than wearing red, white and blue. It means being and supporting the things, the ideals and considerations principles and lifestyles that produce and multiply our freedoms and bravery.
Is the land still there? Is the flag still there? Are we still here?
When we stand and hold hand to heart believing and fighting to defend and give our children the rights and love for the land from which we hail, let us commit again to the biblical principles that God blesses with life and liberty. When we fall away from supporting those principles we are dulling the colors. We are defacing the nation and we are the graffiti on the landscape of freedom and liberty, when we do. We don’t want to be graffiti, do we?
Happy 4th of July

And the rockets red glare…
The bombs bursting in air…