eternal truth

The scriptures are shallow enough for the babe to drink from without drowning, and deep enough for the greatest theologian to swim in without ever touching the bottom.

-St. Jerome

God's plan unfolds

May vineyards flow from all the good the Lord has brought to me,

And richest life extend throughout the land for all to see

That not of my good will or sense the plan unfolds this way,

But in the gracious mind of God tomorrow forms today.

Copyright 2000, Kevin Hartnett

Christmas Joy

Royal King of Kings, Ancient of Days

Oh sing out now with song of praise.

Born in a manger, a baby lay

It was the first, best Christmas day.

Noel, Noel, sing all the earth

Sing of the Savior's lowly birth.

Our voices gifts to use for Him

No time to waste; He will return.

(By Zella May Robinson, my great-grandmother.)

This was a lady who passed down a faithful legacy to succeding generations. When my mother was just a young girl, Zella May prayed for her and for the children whe would have one day. She prayed for me, although I never knew her.

I want to know Christ

All I once held dear built my life upon
All this world reveres, and wars to own
All I once thought gain I have counted loss
Spent and worthless now, compared to this.

Knowing You, Jesus, knowing You
There is no greater thing
You're my all, You're the best
You're my joy, my righteousness
And I love you, Lord

Now my heart's desire is to know You more
To be found in You, and known as yours
To possess by faith what I could not earn
All surpassing gift of righteousness

Knowing You, Jesus, knowing You
There is no greater thing
You're my all, You're the best
You're my joy, my righteousness
And I love you, Lord

Oh to know the power of your risen life
And to know You in your suffering
To become like You in your death my Lord
So with You to live
And never die

Knowing you, Jesus, knowing you
There is no greater thing
You're my all, you're the best
You're my joy, my righteousness
And I love you, Lord

(by Graham Kendrick)

This song is especially meaningful to me because the lyrics are a paraphrase of a passage in Philippians, written by the Apostle Paul. Recently I have studied this book in depth, and it is so rich in thought-provoking wisdom and truth.

But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead

(Philippians 3:7-11).

Am I willing to surrender everything and suffer for the sake of Christ? Do I consider earthly things as "rubbish" compared to the glory of Christ? Do I strive for righteousness of my own, apart from the grace of God? Or do desire with all my being to know Christ? Lord, may this latter be so!

You were faithful

When I enter Heaven's glory
And I see my Savior's face,
I will offer Him ten thousand years of praise.
Then I'll find that special one
In whose life I saw God's Son,
And through tears of joy with trembling lips
These words I'll say:

I saw Jesus in you,
I saw Jesus in you.
I could hear His voice in the words you said
I saw Jesus in you.
In your eyes I saw His care,
I could see His love was there.
You were faithful,
And I saw Jesus in you.

When I stand before my Father
To receive my life's reward,
And my soul is bathed in God's eternal day,
When this race on earth is run,
And God sees the works I've done,
More than any thing I long to hear my Father say:

I saw Jesus in you,
I saw Jesus in you.
I could hear His voice in the words you said
I saw Jesus in you.
In your eyes I saw His care,
I could see His love was there.
You were faithful,
And I saw Jesus in you.

(written by Ron Hamilton)

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winter wonder

"To a Snowflake"

by Francis Thompson

What heart could have thought you?--
Past our devisal
(O filigree petal!)
Fashioned so purely,
Fragilely, surely,
From what Paradisal
Imagineless metal,
Too costly for cost?
Who hammered you, wrought you,
From argentine vapour?--
"God was my shaper.
Passing surmisal,
He hammered, he wrought me,
From curled silver vapour,
To lust of His mind:--
Thou couldst not have thought me!
So purely, so palely,
Tinily, surely,
Mightily, frailly,
Insculped and embossed,
With His hammer of wind,
And His graver of frost."

(Reprinted from An Anthology of Modern Verse, Ed. A. Methuen. London: Methuen & Co., 1921.)