Have you ever had the same illness so often that you learned to recognize it even from the earliest signs? Continue reading
hope
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If you, O church, could only see
The sin that hides inside of me,
Would you maintain that I am free?
That Jesus is my hope and plea?
Would not “Pariah” be my name?
And would you not seek to defame?
And posit me with damning blame,
Though flesh afflicts us all the same?
For all have fallen short of this,
We all take part in Judas’ kiss
And ev’ry man has gone amiss
In search of sin’s mirage of bliss.
But you, O Lord, do truly see
The sin that hides inside of me,
Yet still you heard this sinner’s plea,
And still you came to make men free.
Hope, My Soul, In God
Hope, my soul, in God.
Lift your head and have no fear.
Know, O heart, that he is here.
To this promise, tune your ear.
See his staff and rod.
Hope in his good reign.
Sov’reign over ev’ry sin,
His, the earth and all therein.
Ev’ry battle, he will win.
Trust him through the rain.
“Hope: the best of things.”
Devil, demons, try your might;
You’ve already lost the fight.
Darkness cannot kill the Light.
Peace and joy, he brings.
Salvation
O God, I humbly must confess
My love for all unrighteousness.
My love for you, I know, is less
Than my desire for filthiness.
And I, by my own might, cannot
Erase the blemish, ban the blot
Of sin. This wound I cannot clot.
Apart from help, this life will rot.
So come before this heart of dross
That festers underneath the gloss
Makes of this man a total loss.
O God, how I deserve that cross.
I know there is no good in me.
Your son, I could not hope to be,
For by your Word, I better see:
My only hope must come from Thee.
And though I cannot earn your peace,
By grace you do from sin release
My soul, and cause my death to cease.
Your holy blood has washed my fleece.
Depravity cannot repel
The Savior snatching souls from hell.
And though we wear this dying shell,
Our ears will hear the wedding bell.
So let me never now lose sight
Of your great glory, grace, and might,
And let your holy, saving light
Shine through and make me ever bright.
Ignorance and Faith
Sometimes – nay, often – man has absolutely no idea of what God is doing. And I’m beginning to understand that the tension brought upon our faith by our ignorance of God’s plan is, in some cases, the best place for us to be as we seek to know him better.
Seek The Lord
Photo by Warren Wong on Unsplash
What do you do when you realize that your love for God is sub-par at best? How do you respond when you feel like you’ve forgotten how to pray? What steps do you take when you recognize a deficiency in your walk with the Lord, but you don’t know how to fix the problem?
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Assurance
What God has spoken then
Seems lost before the now,
The call to enter in
Eclipsed before the how.
The weight of life doth wear
Upon the focused brow,
But God knows ev’ry care.
He ever keeps his vow.
So trust we now our King
And hope in his command
And with the angels sing,
For he has made us stand.
We do not face his wrath-
Eternal reprimand-
For we now walk his path,
The purpose he hath planned.
Though circumstances prod,
Fulfilment we shall see,
In spite of shield or sword
Or strong desire to flee.
Thus says the Lord our God,
And thus it comes to be.
The promise of the Lord-
Reliability.
Daniel and Christmas
In the book of Daniel, we read of a handful of God-fearing men who were taken from their homeland and were brought to Babylon to be trained for service to the king. Because of their devotion to the Lord, these men stood out from their peers in wisdom and understanding (Daniel 1:17-21), earning them high places before the king. The stories of how God used these men are extraordinary, so it’s no surprise that many of us learned these stories in Sunday School classes and Vacation Bible Schools growing up. Yet these stories are not just for children.
Truth and Heresy
There never was a “then” when Christ was not,
Only begotten God of God on high.
The Gospel story ever was the plot:
The spotless Lamb for spotted sheep to die.
By nature, men do sin and stand in need
And lack the merit morally required.
And thus, the holy call, “Take up and read,”
Can offer life so lovingly acquired.
The Word was written that we might not sin,
That living branches might bear fruit for life.
Yet when we falter, there is hope again
As Christ called Peter thrice from Peter’s strife.
We read and write for right theology,
That saints would not be swayed by heresy.
Poem Challenge!
When I first began to try my hand at poetry, I practiced by writing poems based on random ideas from my friends. Because of school and work, I haven’t been able to write such a poem in a long time. Today, however, my friend Dustin challenged me to write a spin-off poem of sorts, using the “rebel” idea from the last poem and placing it within the context of Star Wars. I had the time, so I accepted the challenge. I hope you like it!
as i learn to walk 