Dawn's/Worship's Alabaster Flask, Refilled!!

See what great love the Father has lavished on us...1 John 3:1

Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness. Lam.3:22-23

Today, Lord let me recognize the alabaster flask I hold

Lowered from extravagant skies of purple mist and blushing gold

Wherein like precious ointment of great value, moments will reveal

The nature of my deepest love by at whose feet I come to kneel

And at what cost I prove the part that words alone do not disclose;

The sacred throne-room of the heart, and whose reign my devotion shows 

Lord, pray Thee when today is spent; the alabaster flask of dawn

Broken, and its utter content of priceless love lavished upon

The feet of my Lord/lord  You will say with kind and tender sympathy

'she has done all she could today to show her heart of love to me'

Or else, as too oft the case, Lord (and here ashamed, I bow my head)

Forgive me, where I dumbly poured love's perfume on myself instead 

Today, Lord, grant me eyes to see Dawn's Alabaster Flask refilled

With mercy for humanity, before Worship's Spikenard is spilled 

And lavished on the head and feet of that which I most dearly love 

Where rationale of talk is cheap, as I my lord/lord and Master/master prove

By how the moments of today are perceived, measured and outpoured

Either to howls/jowls of dust and clay or with grateful praise to Thee, Lord 

What love you lavish on us Lord; whether we love you in return

Or turn our backs upon your Word, grace shatters dusk's dust and ash Urn

And brushes eternity's brink with virgin hues beyond compare

The perfume of mercy runs pink-blue-gold through daybreak's supine air

Lord, before we start today's tasks and face the foes that vex faith's guard

Tune us to alabaster flasks where worship waits to spill its Nard 

Janet Martin  

Great Is Thy Faithfulness with Lyrics | Lydia Walker

Mark 14:1-9

Now the Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread were only two days away,

 and the chief priests and the teachers of the law were scheming to arrest Jesus secretly and kill him. 

2 “But not during the festival,” they said, “or the people may riot.”

3 While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of Simon the Leper, 

a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard.

 She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head.

4 Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another, 

“Why this waste of perfume? 

5 It could have been sold for more than a year’s wages[a] 

and the money given to the poor.”

 And they rebuked her harshly.

6 “Leave her alone,” said Jesus. “Why are you bothering her? 

She has done a beautiful thing to me. 

7 The poor you will always have with you,[b] 

and you can help them any time you want. 

But you will not always have me. 

8 She did what she could. 

She poured perfume on my body beforehand to prepare for my burial. 

9 Truly I tell you, wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, 

what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”

Where Marriage Is Concerned or Day-by-Day 'I Do'

 

Celebrating 38 years of marriage today,

by the grace of God!

As far as marriage is concerned

Love’s law is nothing new

And anniversaries are earned

By day-to-day ‘I do”

Marriage has much to teach, it seems

As ‘I’ is turned to ‘we’

As imagination and dreams

Meets plain Reality

For love, in all its loveliness

Is wrought at a great price

Its prosperity and success

The prize of sacrifice

As love learns about unity

(for love’s vows never cease)

As love agrees to disagree

For simple sake of peace

As love learns how to stand on guard

Where ‘little foxes’ lurk

Where their play ruins love’s vineyard

Without love’s lifetime work

…and its holy, unglamourous

Crash-course in how to pray

As love discovers faithfulness

Is ‘I do’ every day

‘I do’ through life’s laughter and tears

‘I do’ through gray and gold

‘I do’ until days become years

And youth has lost its hold

(And we have come to sacred terms

About each other’s quirks

His hat will land where’re it lands

In Her head, Poem lurks)

Thank God for Three Strands in love’s Cord

To aid when we go wrong

He helps wounded love be restored

To keep it going/growing strong

Because, where marriage is concerned

Love’s law is nothing new

And anniversaries are earned

By day-to-day ‘I do”

Janet Martin

1 Cor.13:4-8

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.

 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking,

 it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.

 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 

7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails

Love never fails but we do!!

thank-you Lord, for your mercies new each morning,

For your forgiveness that makes possible ours!

Care-cure

Matt.11:28-30

Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

29Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me,

for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

30For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” ~Jesus

1 Pet.5:6-7

Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God,

 that He may exalt you in due time, 

7casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.

Matt.6:34

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, 

for tomorrow will worry about its own things. 

Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. ~Jesus

Today's devotion was a timely command and reminder for me!

Maybe it will be for you as well...

Whether personally, 

or in our immediate families, 

or extended family,

or friend-'family' or church-family, 

or community-'family'

there are immense cares and needs, aren't there?!

There is a cure for care

In a world trouble-torn

There is a steadfast solace where

Courage can be reborn

There is a cure for care

(for care is bound to be)

And we all need a refuge where

Fear and dread’s shadows flee

When disappointments sting

When pain and loss oppress

When body and soul suffering

Afflict hope’s happiness

There is a cure for care

Where faith and mercy meet

God bids us come to Him in prayer

And lay them at his feet

His feet, scarred with prints of

The cross of Calvary

He beckons with unfailing/undying love

‘Come, cast your cares on Me

My all-sufficient grace

Will prove faithful and true

Through every creature-care you face

Because I care for you

Pour out your humble plea

Each burden that you bear

Until, with joy you taste and see

There is a cure for care

Janet Martin

Oh Lord, how we need Your guidance,

Your provision and Your perfect will to work in us;

in every resisting, erring, selfish, doubtful, impatient part

work your wonder in our hearts!

Near to the Heart of God

JIM REEVES HAVE THINE OWN WAY LORD 

A Birthday Poem for The More 'Seasoned' Stage of Surprises!

Happy 62nd Birthday, Jim 

God bless you, guide you and protect you 

as you roll and chug/plug down and up life's highway!

(literally and metaphorically)

 My dear, the years keep hasting by

Where once upon green youth

We thought we had a lot of time

To learn life's changeless truth

And once upon far younger Thought

We dared Time's sleight of hand

By thinking somehow it would not

Heed Father Time's command 

And in spite of what 'Old Folk' said

About how years unfold

With gathered speed, we tossed our heads

And winked, youth-and dream-bold 

But now, with much more 'seasoned' stance

And sass and strut subdued 

We take each new day that God grants

With humbler gratitude

...where, as spent sun-up and sun-down 

Weathers youth's girl or boy

Pray we find in time's wizened crown

Sweet surprises of joy

Trading the fast-fading façade

Of face and form, my dear

For truer, purer love/awe for God

With every passing year

Counting, not loss, but gain, dear friend

And blessings beyond score

So that we cannot find the end

Of things we're thankful for 

Love always, from your wife

Janet Martin 

A blast from the past!!

Time-Don Williams

Yesterday's Sunday morning message passage

is the perfect prayer for today and every day of the year!

Phil.1:9-11

And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more

 in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best 

and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, 

filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—

to the glory and praise of God.

From Here to Him

Whether we live a day or a hundred years

(like my friend's grandma who lives in Switzerland

and  traveled to Brazil recently!!)

our final breath dissolves Time in eternity!

What was, whether a day or a hundred years, 

then, forever turned to what is!!

Oh, pray somewhere along The Way from Here to Him 

we prepare to meet God who loves us so much

He paid the debt/fare we owed to purchase

The Way to be saved from

the consequence and penalty of sin! John 3:16

And we are all sinners in need of a Saviour!

Josh Turner ~ I Serve a Savior

1 John 1:9

If we confess our sins, 

He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins 

and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

John 14:6

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life.

 No one comes to the Father except through me.

John 11:25

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. 

The one who believes in me will live, even though they die;

The Way of the Cross Leads Home - Hymn with Lyrics

 

Life's way varied in its topography brings everyone, ultimately,

back to the Giver of life...

no matter who, where, how old or young we are

when we leave this world

by one way or another, from the four corners of the earth,

we all come from Here to Him!

Oh, that we would 'know' Him before

we meet Him face to face!

How brutal often, seems the way that draws us dearer and nearer to Him!

By passageways through vale and mount that forge, from faith's leap, hope renewed

And stirs in souls, a hallowed fount of deeper, purer gratitude

By struggles on a way called 'straight/Strait', as self-will and surrender spar

As love weathers lessons of 'wait', while we learn who we really are

By secret prayers in private rooms where God alone can enter in

To cup confession's tear-stained bloom, to forgive and cleanse us from sin

By way of Ebenezer's stone, where worship erects monuments

Of praise; 'Thus far the Lord has shown His help, and His deliverance

By the way of the cross, we find, past Golgotha and Calvary

Faith's birthplace where once we were blind, but by the grace of God, we see

By the way to Damascus, where, bent on some mission, boldly braved

For worldly laud, God met us there, and by his mercy we were saved 

By the way of faith undeterred, by the way of love's battles grim

By the way of His faithful Word, God gathers us, from Here to Him 

Janet Martin

1 Sa.7:12

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen, 

and called its name [a]Ebenezer, saying,

 “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”

Come Thou Fount Of Every Blessing (lyrics & chord) Chris Rice

Perspective Pause...

If, in all that we do, we view the One who grants the life we live

Then we will find love's purpose kind, and give the best we have to give

What joy to know he loves us so and helps us do the best we can

With thankful heart, to do our part to love Him first then fellowman

This is the day the Lord has made, like an alter beneath our feet

What will the price of sacrifice reveal as we, love's charges meet?

Will we be weighed with joy dismayed, or will we rejoice and be glad

To know God's love will surely prove faithful through both life's good and bad

Janet Martin

 

Wonder-Thunder

God talks to us in every bloom

With matchless eloquence

In great and small, earth's garden-room

Heralds His evidence/excellence

Without a syllable or sound

He tells us of His might

In petal-designs that confound

Awed gaze with pure delight

He chooses hues beyond compare

And woos us to be still

And rest in Heaven's foothills where

Hints of His glory spill

Janet Martin

Psalm 111:2
Great are the works of the LORD; 

they are pondered by all who delight in them.

Psalm 104:24 BSB
How many are Your works, O LORD!

 In wisdom You have made them all; 

the earth is full of Your creatures.

Ps. 104-KJV: v.24& 31- 35

O LORD, how manifold are thy works! 

in wisdom hast thou made them all:

the earth is full of thy riches.

...31The glory of the LORD shall endure for ever:

 the LORD shall rejoice in his works.

32He looketh on the earth, and it trembleth:

 he toucheth the hills, and they smoke.

33I will sing unto the LORD as long as I live: 

I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.

34My meditation of him shall be sweet:

 I will be glad in the LORD.

35Let the sinners be consumed out of the earth, 

and let the wicked be no more. 

Bless thou the LORD, O my soul. 

Praise ye the LORD.

The Consequence of Spring

On Friday we had our annual potato-planting with our grandchildren💚

My, the years do fly...

 2024

2025

2026

(This year youngest grandson gave up in disgust,

being literally left in the dust 😂💖)

Whether planting Soul-sod or Earth-sod

Spring is a brief and precious time of very sacred toil...

Spring is a brief and precious Time of very sacred toil

As we redeem its hasting chime with seeds set into soil

How swift sweet planting season skims to Bygone’s soldered keep

And once-upon-barren-plot brims with fruit, ready to reap

Spring is life’s bright and beautiful fresh opportunity

To seize the day with dutiful delight’s humility

And ask He who instills the seed with awesome opulence

To help us plant with earnest heed and careful diligence

Spring is life’s hopeful time of year; as to the broken sod

We scatter seeds and feel so near to the heartbeat of God

As the substance of fruit hoped for and harvest still unseen

Soon bares/bears Evidence by the score, where barren plots had been

…for we reap what we sow; the loom of Spring is brief indeed

The Substance of The Hoped For Bloom begins with planted seed

Its beauty (or the lack thereof) unveils the Consequence

Of Spring, and faith’s consciousness of Harvest and Providence

Janet Martin

2 Cor.9:6

Remember this: 

Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly,

and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.

Gal.6:7-10

Do not be deceived: God is not to be mocked.

Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return.

8The one who sows to please his flesh, 

from the flesh will reap destruction;

but the one who sows to please the Spirit, 

from the Spirit will reap eternal life.

9Let us not grow weary in well-doing,

for in due time we will reap a harvest

 if we do not give up.

10Therefore, as we have opportunity, 

let us do good to everyone, 

and especially to the family of faith.