Recently I bought the CD “Speechless” by Steven Curtis Chapman. Last night I was listening to it, probably for the first time all the way through, while doing the dishes. When the song “With Hope” came on, it explains one of the reasons why I became a Christian. It made me think of my brothers. I have two you see, one on earth and the other passed before I could met him. He was only young and severely disabled, so I know one day I will meet him. That will be the second most important meeting for me after standing face to face with my Saviour. Here are the words.
This is not at all how
We thought it was supposed to be
We had so many plans for you
We had so many dreams
And now you’ve gone away
And left us with the memories of your smile
And nothing we can say
And nothing we can do
Can take away the pain
The pain of losing you, but…
We can cry with hope
We can say goodbye with hope
‘Cause we know our goodbye is not the end, oh no
And we can grieve with hope
‘Cause we believe with hope
(There’s a place by God’s grace)
There’s a place where we’ll see your face again
We’ll see your face again
And never have I known
Anything so hard to understand
And never have I questioned more
The wisdom of God’s plan
But through the cloud of tears
I see the Father’s smile and say well done
And I imagine you
Where you wanted most to be
Seeing all your dreams come true
‘Cause now you’re home
And now you’re free, and…
We can cry with hope
We can say goodbye with hope
‘Cause we know our goodbye is not the end, oh no
And we can grieve with hope
‘Cause we believe with hope
(There’s a place by God’s grace)
There’s a place where we’ll see your face again
We’ll see your face again
We have this hope as an anchor
‘Cause we believe that everything
God promised us is true, so…
We can cry with hope
We can say goodbye with hope
‘Cause we know our goodbye is not the end, oh no
And we can grieve with hope
‘Cause we believe with hope
(There’s a place by God’s grace)
There’s a place where we’ll see your face again
We’ll see your face again
We wait with hope
And we ache with hope
We hold on with hope
We let go with hope
Music makes the world go round for me, always has. I used to always have music playing but since having children and a husband who doesn’t enjoy music as much as me I don’t so much anymore. I missed my music for a while, but got used to it. I also used to get annoying songs stuck in my head (like THAT Kylie song). I prayed for God to stop that from happening and instead of making them stop altogether I now have a jukebox! I seem to be able to “play” songs in my head! (This is how the Holy Spirit would give me the songs for worship many years ago when I lead for a brief time).
So what’s been playing on my internal jukebox?
I was reading Our Daily Bread this morning as a part of my morning devotions. The writer was highlighting the ancient city of Sodom whose people suffered God’s judgement, in part because they embraced a self-indulgent lifestyle. “This was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty and committed abomination before Me; therefore I took them away as I saw fit” Ezekiel 16:49-50. Basically they were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned.
If we are honest with ourselves, we can see many similarities with today’s western lifestyle.
Most people are proud of their cars, houses and other things. (Pride)
Most people don’t have to struggle and toil to put food on the table. (Overfed)
Most people, while not at a paid job, don’t generally do anything to overtaxing. (Idleness)
Most people don’t think of the severe injustice and lack of choice and freedom that the poorest of poor people all over the world and in our country have to face every day. (not strengthening the poor/needy)
This makes me think that perhaps God isn’t too happy with the way we choose to spend our time. Perhaps he has a better way that would profit us as well as Him. In Philippians 2:4 Paul tells us to serve others and desire to please God, this is the antidote to the poison of self-indulgence.
At the bottom of each page in Our Daily Bread is a verse and a summary line. Here are today’s.
Some are discouraged and weary in heart,
Help somebody today!
Someone the journey to heaven should start,
Help somebody today! –Breck
Recently I read this beautiful short story below about ItzhakPerlman, a violinist playing in New York. However, after reading the story, you too will see that it is a much deeper story than one just about a musician playing on stage. It is actually an inspirational and touching story showing us that we can all ‘make music’ in our lives no matter how difficult our circumstances are.
On Nov. 18, 1995, ItzhakPerlman, the violinist, came on stage to give a concert at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City. If you have ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that getting on stage is no small achievement for him. He was stricken with polio as a child, and so he has braces on both legs and walks with the aid of two crutches. To see him walk across the stage one step at a time, painfully and slowly, is an awesome sight. He walks painfully, yet majestically, until he reaches his chair. Then he sits down, slowly, puts his crutches on the floor, undoes the clasps on his legs, tucks one foot back and extends the other foot forward. Then he bends down and picks up the violin, puts it under his chin, nods to the conductor and proceeds to play.
By now, the audience is used to this ritual. They sit quietly while he makes his way across the stage to his chair. They remain reverently silent while he undoes the clasps on his legs. They wait until he is ready to play. But this time, something went wrong. Just as he finished the first few bars, one of the strings on his violin broke. You could hear it snap — it went off like gunfire across the room. There was no mistaking what that sound meant. There was no mistaking what he had to do.
People who were there that night thought to themselves: “We thought that he would have to get up, put on the clasps again, pick up the crutches and limp his way off stage to either find another violin or else find another string for this one.”
But he didn’t. Instead, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then signaled the conductor to begin again. The orchestra began, and he played from where he had left off. And he played with such passion and such power and such purity, as they had never heard before. Of course, anyone knows that it is impossible to play a symphonic work with just three strings. I know that, and you know that, but that night ItzhakPerlman refused to know that. You could see him modulating, changing, re-composing the piece in his head. At one point, it sounded like he was de-tuning the strings to get new sounds from them that they had never made before.
When he finished, there was an awesome silence in the room. And then people rose and cheered. There was an extraordinary outburst of applause from every corner of the auditorium. We were all on our feet, screaming and cheering, doing everything we could to show how much we appreciated what he had done.
He smiled, wiped the sweat from this brow, raised his bow to quiet us, and then he said, not boastfully, but in a quiet, pensive, reverent tone, “You know, sometimes it is the artist’s task to find out how much music you can still make with what you have left.”
What a powerful line that is. It has stayed in my mind ever since I heard it. And who knows? Perhaps that is the definition of life… not just for artists but for all of us. Here is a man who has prepared all his life to make music on a violin of four strings, who, all of a sudden, in the middle of a concert, finds himself with only three strings; so he makes music with three strings, and the music he made that night with just three strings was more beautiful, more sacred, more memorable, than any that he had ever made before, when he had four strings.
So, perhaps our task in this fast-changing and often bewildering world in which we live is to make music, at first with all that we have, and then, when that is no longer possible, to make music with what we have left.
I don’t know where this originates, but I received it recently in an email. It laments the perceived invisibility of the modern American Mum. It also reminds me that we ALL – not just mothers – at times, are in places and situations when we wonder why we are putting in all the effort because “no one will ever notice” but there is someone who notices and watches and celebrates and loves you all the time.
Please enjoy and remember that God watches over the righteous and the wicked. (Proverbs)
Invisible Mother……
It all began to make sense, the blank stares, the lack of response, the way one of the kids will walk into the room while I’m on the phone and ask to be taken to the store. Inside I’m thinking, ‘Can’t you see I’m on the phone?’
Obviously not; no one can see if I’m on the phone, or cooking, or sweeping the floor, or even standing on my head in the corner, because no one can see me at all. I’m invisible. The invisible Mom.
Some days I am only a pair of hands, nothing more! Can you fix this? Can you tie this? Can you open this?? Some days I’m not a pair of hands; I’m not even a clock to ask, ‘What time is it?’ I’m a satellite guide to answer, ‘What number is the Disney Channel?’ I’m a car to order, ‘Right around 5:30, please.’
I was certain that these were the hands that once held books and the eyes that studied history and the mind that graduated summa cum laude – but now, they had disappeared into the peanut butter, never to be seen
again. She’s going, she’s going, she’s gone!?
One night, a group of us were having dinner, celebrating the return of a friend from England. Janice had just gotten back from a fabulous trip, and she was going on and on about the hotel she stayed in. I was sitting
there, looking around at the others all put together so well. It was hard not to compare and feel sorry for myself. I was feeling pretty pathetic, when Janice turned to me with a beautifully wrapped package, and said, ‘I brought you this.’ It was a book on the great cathedrals of Europe. I wasn’t exactly sure why she’d given it
to me until I read her inscription: ‘To Charlotte , with admiration for the greatness of what you are building when no one sees.’ In the days ahead I would read – no, devour – the book. And I would discover what would become for me, four life-changing truths, after which I could pattern my work:
No one can say who built the great cathedrals – we have no record of their names.
These builders gave their whole lives for a work they would never see finished.
They made great sacrifices and expected no credit.
The passion of their building was fueled by their faith that the eyes of God saw everything.
A legendary story in the book told of a rich man who came to visit the cathedral while it was being built, and he saw a workman carving a tiny bird on the inside of a beam. He was puzzled and asked the man, ‘Why are
you spending so much time carving that bird into a beam that will be covered by the roof; No one will ever see it. And the workman replied, ‘Because God sees.’
I closed the book, feeling the missing piece fall into place. It was almost as if I heard God whispering to me, ‘I see you, Charlotte. I see the sacrifices you make every day, even when no one around you does. No act of kindness you’ve done, no sequin you’ve sewn on, no cupcake you’ve baked, is too small for me to notice and smile over. You are building a great cathedral, but you can’t see right now what it will become.
At times, my invisibility feels like an affliction. But it is not a disease that is erasing my life. It is the cure for the disease of my own self-centeredness. It is the antidote to my strong, stubborn pride.
I keep the right perspective when I see myself as a great builder. As one of the people who show up at a job that they will never see finished, to work on something that their name will never be on.
The writer of the book went so far as to say that no cathedrals could ever be built in our lifetime because there are so few people willing to sacrifice to that degree.
When I really think about it, I don’t want my son to tell the friend he’s bringing home from college for Thanksgiving, ‘My Mom gets up at 4 in the morning and bakes homemade pies, and then she hand bastes a
turkey for 3 hours and presses all the linens for the table.’ That would mean I’d built a shrine or a monument to myself. I just want him to want to come home. And then, if there is anything more to say to his friend, to add, ‘You’re gonna love it there.’
As mothers, we are building great cathedrals. We cannot be seen if we’re doing it right. And one day, it is very possible that the world will marvel, not only at what we have built, but at the beauty that has been added to the world by the sacrifices of invisible women.
The Will of God will never take you where the Grace of God will not protect you.
Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows. Matthew 10:29-31NIV
Yesterdays Our Daily Bread spoke to me and I want to share it for my post today
Finding Our Calling
I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord,
beseech you to walk worthy of the calling
with which you were called. — Ephesians 4:1
A continuing struggle as we seek to follow Christ is trying to find our calling in life. While we often think in terms of occupation and location, perhaps a more important issue is one of character—the being that undergirds doing. “Lord, who do You want me to be?”
In Ephesians 4, Paul wrote, “I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called” (v.1). He followed this with three “be’s,” as one translation renders it: be humble, be gentle, be patient, “bearing with one another in love” (v.2 NIV). Paul wrote this from prison, a difficult place where he continued to live out his calling from God.
Oswald Chambers said: “Consecration is not the giving over of the calling in life to God, but the separation from all other callings and the giving over of ourselves to God, letting His providence place us where He will—in business, or law, or science; in workshop, in politics, or in drudgery. We are to be there working according to the laws and principles of the Kingdom of God.”
When we are the right people before God, we can do whatever task He sends, wherever He puts us. In so doing, we discover and affirm His calling for us. — David C. McCasland
You are called with a holy calling
The light of the world to be;
To lift up the lamp of the gospel
That others the light may see. —Anon.
It’s not what you do but who you are that’s most important.
