Restore Common Grace, Dear Lord.

Pastor Loran guided our minds through the minefield of grief in this recent tragedy that our nation has suffered. When he spoke about common grace, my minds eye saw the cutting of the cords of common grace in the season that we are now in. We saw these days coming and we have prayed for grace and strength and hope to endure. We saw the removal of the Commandments from the schools and the removal of prayer and the replacement of these things with Videogames. What else can ensue, but that a young man would target youngsters as though they were in a videogame. He and many have no reference of God. Pastor Loran snatched my mind from my man-centered perspective and placed it on the God of all grace who has been grieved and is removing His hand from our nation. This is a more hopeful mental picture for me, because God is our Lord and He is easily entreated and we can beg His grace and the return of His hand upon us. I was hopeful thinking in this way. The cord cutting was a semi-darwinian thought in that I saw us tumbling into "Lost in Space" spiritual condition, ever tumbling away and away from goodness and grace. This state of North Carolina has shown me so much of the beauty of the common grace of God that it is somewhat uncanny that Pastor Loran would be talking about its absence. The beauty of the skyline beautified with lights and kindness and not with sultriness,{not entirely, but much more than my beloved NY}. I can see the common grace of Gods hand blessing, if only for the offering that this state has made in sending Billy Graham across the world to win souls. Common grace is tangible here, they know it and enjoy it. They also take it for granted. They often don't even think that it should be prayed for, as the churches in NY know how to do so well. If we don't ask God in NY, the devil is sure to vanquish us. We know that, who are from NY. So we pray and we believe in prayer. O that God would give us the tradition that stabalizes the hand of God upon us for good and that we would know the grace to pray for the continued presence of God, which we do not deserve, no matter how many Billy Grahams have come from our land. God we trust Your care for us and make us Yours in tradition and in prayer. In Jesus Name, Amen

Sometimes, I think that grief is one of the devil's greatest weapons against the believer.

I can hardly tell the difference between my own soul and the devil, in grief cycles. I don't know if it is the devil accusing God, or my own heart, when it comes to grief of loss of my child. I only knew him 21 days and the devil can make me look at God in worst ways, when I look through that chasm of dark meditations. I do pray for the parents in Newtown and the other parents who empathize because of their own pains that are pricked by these sad trajedies. I pray that the Church of Christ will be aware of the pain that our brethren are feeling and what a danger it is to the souls of the grieving and be gracious to those whose hearts are in anguish because and through this season, now and for the rest of their lives. My tragedy happened on Easter and there is never a day that doesn't jarr the pot that houses thoses tender grief sensors. Shock makes us able to cope initially and then the days come and unwrap new accusations of God that must be pulled up like weeds and thorns that can choke any true faith from the soul. These tender souls need the special care of the church of the Lord Jesus. I pray that they will be instructed in the true value of prayer and praise in the life of the believer. I pray that they will be protected by elders who will not allow their souls to become prey to the wicked one. I pray that their lives will be seen as the mission of their churches to see them carried to glory on the pallet that their grief has placed them on. May they not, like "Heidi's grandfather", be left to curmudgeon outside of the community, because of their sad uncomfortability with levity in the midst of their inexpressable grief. Like the Lord Jesus, may the church give these dear and saddened people a place to bring their accusations against God and place them before the people of God, to have them prayed for, that they might find grace and help to grow and see God through the dark clouds that will only grow deeper and more sickening with the days of loss that will follow. Help us to remember the people with compassion. Lord, had you been there my brother would not have died, said the dearest friends of Jesus. Surely, we have no dearer relationship than they do. Help us not to sin so greatly in unbelief that You would not restore us. Help us to show that true sympathy and hope of the resurrection of the dead that Jesus showed to His dear ones in their grief. Thank You, dear Jesus that You are not daunted by grief from loving us. Show Your love to those people through the Church of Christ upon the earth, through acts of kindness and loving sermons and visitations and prayer and listening ears. Lord, You said that we could do these greater works in these days and we pray that You would own these works as we do them for Your glory. May we not be those who reprove and rebuke the pained and stricken, may Your people find a heart to love the stricken and draw unbelievers to learn of the true God, in their grief and believers to be unwound from the choking cares that grief inevitably inflicts. Not for our glory in this generation, but that Your name would be honored and praised upon the earth. In Jesus Name. Amen.

The Sacrifice of Praise is due, whenever our wicked hearts are tempted to murmur and complain.

I thank God for the examples of elder people who exemplified this truth in my life.  I have seen the power and strength of this truth at a time of my personal greatest anguish.  God was inhabiting my praise and empowering me above my strength.
I felt all strength leave my legs at my baby's funeral.  I felt the surge of strength when God's people sang in unison behind me. It was truly dynamic and supernatural.  I believe that it was what got me up when I fell, time and again.  Still, my heart falls into murmuring and disfunction, but, I know that God is worthy of the praise in my heart, even when I don't feel it.  He can and does handle my complaints and questions. Lord, why?  What are You achieving in my life through this pain?  God knows and cares and picks me up from the muddy banks of selfish anguish and carries me into the knowledge that He is greater.
"Halleluia, anyhow" was sung by older people in church and I used to wonder how they could sing that. I guess I still do, but as a discipline, I worship the God who is above all of the circumstances.  He has chosen to say no to my utmost desire. To see my eldest son live his life.  He was taken at 21 days old.  I know that God is greater and has my good in His care, whether I understand it or not.  He has the rest of my life in His care.  The sadnesses that come and griefs that we endure will be understood, by and by.  Until then, Thank God that we have a faithful and strong High Priest who is in the Heavenlies interceding for us.  I might complain, on occasion and He will guide me through the struggle to the safety of higher ground where I can cast my cares upon Him, who cares for me.
That's why I love Jesus and praise Him.

I do love Psalm 34.

Psalm 34:21 Evil shall slay the wicked: and they that hate the righteous shall be desolate. Psalm 34:22 The LORD redeemeth the soul of his servants: and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate.

It is one of my greatest comforts and still one of my greatest questions. I experience God's filling and fulfilling and I experience desolation and longing and wonder at God's goodness and my undeservedness of each. Are you here to bring to light my secret sin?, said the woman to Elijah. None of them who trust in Him will be desolate? Why do we suffer want? Outside of Christ, God owes us suffering. Redemption is the "fulfillment". God has come that we, who were owed suffering could experience redemption, in Christ. Ultimately, all of our needs are met. In the meantime, we wonder... When I am desolate, I think "am I in the camp that hate the righteous?" When I am fulfilled, I think, "am I in the camp of the righteous?" Christ is the payment for sin and we will know both the want and the fulfillment, but God is above it all. We trust Him to fulfill and to give to those who are His own, as He has promised. I have known empty days as all people do. I have wondered how this promise could be true, if I am suffering so. I have walked blindly in that area of life and expected God to prove Himself to me in that area of my life. Because I am desolate makes God no less God is learned as we trust Him. I see myself in this season, as Peninah to my dear sweet daughters, as I rejoice in what, to them is desolation. I thank God for their delay in child-bearing and they hate my rejoicing in this. I see how God is so far above our longings. It is in "REDEMPTION" that we are fulfilled. He is truly in control and keeps things, sufficient for the time when we can bear them. He knows our frame and considers that we are dust. My longings do not stay His hand or speed it up. His time-frame is sovereign and set. My blessings of full quiver and loving family do not keep Him from blessing more. We can still have that which we can expect, even when we are overflowing with His provision. Fear, keeps us from seeing His oversight in our sad states. He is above our infirmities and our healing. He is above our delights and our challenges. He is truly faithful to my soul in desolations and delights. Halleluia, what a Savior!.

The Mercy of God, that it wasn't worse.

Thank you, Dear Lord, for your mercy to grant us all that we need for the deliverance in times such as these. Thank you for the wonderful and consciencious leadership of the government officials; Mayor Bloomberg, Governor Cuomo, Governor Christie and others who directed with a steady hand the goings on of the recent and continued storm crisis that we are enduring. We pray for continued assistance to their hearts and minds for strength and peace and help that they would have the continued help to present a committed leadership picture to us that will help the city and the country keep a level head in a crisis. This is truly from Your hand, Dearest Lord. You calmed the disciples in the boat and had the entire storm in Your predisposing, we see in Scripture. Still, You were sensitive to the plights of the weak. Give peace and a sense of Your presence to those men who must act in strength before a people whose emotions are at the brink. Thank You for helping and guiding them. God, please give grace to the grieving and disturbed at this time. Thank You that Your mercy was evident and we pray for more mercy in the clean up. In the name of the Savior of Sinners and the King of Kings, Jesus, Amen.

He will beautify the meek with salvation" A prayer for bending the knee under the Sovereign Hand of a Mighty God of the

Universe.

Hurricane Sandy has come with force winds. We city dwellers have, for generations laughed in the face of such storms. Unwittingly laughing at the reminders that God gives us of His sovereignty. These storms have provoked our pagan pride and we repent at this time, Dear Lord. In the light of the humility we see in the North Carolinian submission to Your divine intervention in creation. We bow our heads and we bow our knees in repentance and faith that You have every right to level our city in this storm and in any way that You see fit. We beg, in wrath that You remember mercy! We know that we have provoked You to Your face, mimimizing Your great power in the winds and in the waves. We have seen it as a challenge to build against Your forces, as though we were competing with Your wrath. We have sent souls to their doom, in airplanes and boats and laughed that they and we had not bowed at Your fierce wrath, exhibitted in the storm. We repent dear Lord. We glory not in our stocks of animals to the demise of the souls given to our care. We glory not in the bucklers that we have built with our own hands to stand against Your fury. We know that they are matchsticks against Your true and just fury against our sins. We submit and confess to You that we are learning to bow under Your just judgments against us. We have no power against Your wrath and we have no reason to glory except that we know that the Lord Jesus paid it all for our souls' salvation, at the cross of Calvary. God, You are our God. You said to Abraham that if there would have been 10 in the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah you would not have demolished them. We have sinned against light and deserve far worse than they received, except for Your love and mercy that has been showered upon us. We must learn from more humble peoples not to provoke You as we have made a habit of doing in our unbelief. Your storms are reminders to care for the less fortunate. The people who have no wall of protection and the people who are incapable of finding a shelter in the storm, give us grace to see this in the fierceness of Your exhibitions of power. We know that You are sovereign and we pray that You will use this to draw us to Yourself and to give us grace to grow and learn to emulate Your mercy as we have emulated Your power and strength in our cities. Hold us and guide us to the humble path as our sins make us rise in sinful pride. We love You Lord and pray for mercy and grace to learn and grow, In Jesus Name. Amen.

What happens when we are overexposed?

Years ago, there used to be camera film to process, in nearly everyone's home. You kept these precious memories in a dark place, lest the overexposure to the sun make them useless remembrances of days and events. Exposure to light would darken the image and no photograph could be produced from the film. I have sat in the sun and played in the sun, until my own skin has been so black that I could be nearly invisible for the blackness. Soon, with less exposure, my complexion would return to normal and I was myself again. Only Grandma would castigate my heedless exposure to the sun. Skin is limited, she would warn. There is only so much sunshine that the skin can endure without skin cancer developing. I kept these warnings in my heart and took care, although ever so incredulously, to try to keep my skin from so much sun. Sometimes, I fear that those whose job it is to handle the Word of Truth may suffer from overexposure to the attributes of God. What are the symptoms of this malady? I know that in my own soul there have been seasons of overexposure and overuse of one specific attribute of God, or means of grace that I have stumbled over and suffered dearly. The clouds of vicisitude roll in and all you have of faith, is like a lightning ball in your hand. It has no power to direct your path. It is simply light and heat as a posession. Perhaps, you do not altogether lose your assurance of salvation, but it does little in your life to preserve from sin and keep from insecurity and draw closer to the God of all Glory. Thank God that He is the author and the finisher of our faith. He is the tender and keeper of our hearts and minds and not we, ourselves. I see Him, {in my mind's eye} preparing a cat of ninetails for my soul to turn over the fallowness of my moneychangers self remnants. In eternal love, He removes the self-preserved unholy uses of holy ambitions. Sometimes, it is in meeting someone whose struggle is completely opposite of my own. Sometimes, it is the darkness of griefs that roll in like the tide that turns me on my ear and remind me of the need to hold onto God and not my ambitions for God or for myself in God. Somedays my heart feels like the chaff, crushed and scattered, for aching. Is that what you meant is the fruit of unbelief, when my broken heart is unable to be gathered for the dissimulation? God reminds me that He is greater than my heart. Some preach and teach from such a guarded heart that they are always the predator of hearts and never the preyed upon. Jesus stated that He sends us forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. The predator of hearts is a state that is in danger of perhaps having been seared.

Blessed is the man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly...

Where are you God, when I am overexposed? When I am feeling my heart, like chaff flitting and broken and hardened and preyed upon and a predator? Even then, God has the remedy. Even then, it is not unto us to find or be the remedy. It is God who will fashion the instruments of right exposure and right sensitivity to sin and to unrighteousness. God is growing us up into Christ in all things. Service and challenge can be a jarring element to shake us from this fatal ease. Decorum can be a curtain of hiding our impurities until we are dealt with by God's Word, in discipline and restoration. We know when we are in the danger of making shipwreck of our faith. Those closest to the light and heat of the power of God are the most in danger of really being deceived by demons. Satan, himself sits as an angel of light. Help us Lord, who know You and feel that we love You, be submitted to Your word in truth and not for our own glory. Desensitize our overexposure and restore our skin from the burns that we have inflicted upon ourselves. Disect our intentions to us that we may be true to You and not deceived by our own lusts. We will glorify Your name for Your faithfulness to our souls. In Jesus name, Amen.