Showing posts with label Remembrance Day. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Remembrance Day. Show all posts

Saturday, November 11, 2023

Freedom's Price is Steep


If only we only took time
to humbly and kindly love
If only we lived as if we believed
That what God/love gives is enough

***

Until we change our ways to God's ways, 
war will not change its ways

***

I have shared these excerpts from Peter Marshall's Sermon
The American Dream, a few times before
But truth is timeless!


The phrase below could just as well be read 'we in Canada' 😥🙏



Freedom’s price is steep where after-effects run deep; their loss, our gain
Freedom is never free, but a hard-fought and blood-wrought cross of pain
Love, the greatest command never fails; but kingdoms rise and fall
When leaders turn away and disobey God who is Lord of all

The Author and Authority of love is long-suff’ring and kind
Without Him we are a pathetic case of blind leading the blind

Until we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, strength and mind
Freedom will fail. Travail of war will scream, blood red, dread’s streams unwind
God’s light shines on great darkness; a darkness that does not comprehend
The love of He who sets us free; whose death purchased life without end

If only we would take to heart the wage of disobedience
And would fear God, and love His Word, not treat Him with indifference
For ‘unto us a child was born, One whose kingdom will never cease
His Name, Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Prince of Peace

Freedom’s price is steep where after-effects run deep; His loss, our gain
Freedom is never free; His cost, a love-wrought, blood-bought cross of pain
Love, the greatest command never fails; great nations rise and fall
And will until all fear and believe in He who is Lord of all

© Janet Martin

Isa. 9:6
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: 
and the government shall be upon his shoulder: 
and his name shall be called Wonderful, 
Counsellor, 
The mighty God, 
The everlasting Father, 
The Prince of Peace.

More timeless truth from Jeremiah 






Who is wise and understanding among you?
 Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom.
  14But if you have bitter envy and [h]self-seeking in your hearts, 
do not boast and lie against the truth. 
15This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic.
  16For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. 
17But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, 
gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, 
without partiality and without hypocrisy. 
18Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace 
by those who make peace. 
James 3:13-18









Wednesday, November 11, 2020

This Is November


"This is November; the month to remember 
All those who fought for ‘true North strong and free’ "


What a blessing to be able to
cherish life's loveliness-es in a country where we are free to do so!
Free (covid-restrictions aside) to come and go as we please!
This freedom comes at a great price!
Lest We Forget




This is the season of silver-silk haloes 
Crowning milkweed in gauzy silhouettes 
Landscapes a-glimmer with stubble and furrows 
Shadows soft-stenciled like penciled vignettes 


This is the season of silence. Leaf-laughter 
Snuffed like a flicker from each woodland wick 
Now our senses are drawn to a rafter 
Now blue, now gray, now Day cut to the quick 



This is the season of tender surrender 
Baring of secrets that full foliage kept 
Doffed of the flower but never the splendor 
Where leaf-confetti is scattered and swept 


This is the season of Nature’s stark beauty 
Before heavens unfurl winter’s oriflamme 
Flinging white featherdown o’er town and country 
Muffling the brittle ballad of Autumn


This is the season of brook song refurbished 
Gone to seed thistle-weed-parachute flight 
Caught on a current of sunbeams, dusk-burnished 
Glint of gold gossamer soon lost to sight 


This is the season of Collected Treasure
Bloom dappled meadow, an echo of Thought
Playing back pictures of picnic-lunch pleasure 
Crooning a postlude of  'forget-me-not'


This is November; the month to remember 
All those who fought for ‘true North strong and free’ 
This is November; the last glowing ember 
On a hearth kindled with Expectancy 

© Janet Martin

An Oldie to remind us there is 

No 'Free' in Freedom

Somber and steady up a tree-lined street
A stream of solemn soldier-ranks are led,
As sun-beams dance to the drummer’s beat
Filtering through the branches overhead
Beyond the tears and past the arc of trees
The music of a small child’s laughter swells
Stark contrast to the mourning infantry
Bowing beneath the tolling of the bells

Then, as the weeping bag-pipe song exalts
The melody of sweet Amazing Grace
Then, as the banner-covered coffin halts
For it has reached its final resting place
Then, as the last note fades the cannon flies
Its echo fills the air from shore to shore
Yet pales in the wake of a mother’s cries
“There is no ‘free’ in freedom anymore

Put down your banners, lay down your guns
My sweet baby boy has died
Tributes, salutes, many battles won
Won’t bring him back” she cried
“Take away all the roses for nothing will be
Like it ever was before
The price of freedom is too hard for me
There is no ‘free’ in freedom anymore”

Freedom (part two)

Upon Golgotha’s rocky skull-strewn trail
A teaming, screaming throng of hatred surged
Swarming around a form blood-bathed and pale
Upon a place called Calvary they converged
Wild, wild with rage wages hate’s vicious roar
No one remains to defend Love unbound
Stark contrast to the cheers and praise before
Where palm-tree branches waved and decked the ground

Then as the violent blows of steel on steel
Accentuates the horror on the hill
Then, as they drive in hatred nail by nail
Against Love’s cries of ‘Father, not My will’
Then, as they praised and raised Life’s blood-stained cross
In victory, death’s maddened thousands roar
As Mary, his mother weeps for her loss
“There is no ‘free’ in freedom anymore

Take away your hammers, lay down your swords
My dear precious son has died”
As the lightning flashed and the thunder roared
There at His feet she cried
“Take away all your hatred, your jeers and chanting
For you have slain my Lord
Take away all your weapons and cease your ranting
There is no ‘free’ in freedom anymore”

There is no ‘free’ in freedom, Love pays a price
Where hellish horrors run
There is no ‘free’ in freedom, its sacrifice
Save in Christ, is never done
There is no ‘free’ in freedom, red the river
That flows on its behalf
There is no 'free' in freedom; its signature
A blood-stained autograph

© Janet Martin




Monday, November 11, 2019

Expression of Awareness


May we live to remember 
the freedom we enjoy 
whether in outings...


...or ordinary days
...is something we should never take for granted!


For what we have
Someone gave
For how we live
Someone died
Someone who
had families
Who filled them
with love and pride
Someone who
laid hopes and dreams
on lines
they didn’t want to cross
someone who
for freedom’s gain
suffered loss

Should we not then
Reflect in all
we do and say
A love-and-kindness
gratitude
For the freedom we have
Today

© Janet Martin

Friday, November 9, 2018

Of Country Love and Pride



 Zoomed by this fantastic flag-display in rush-hour traffic
 in Charlottetown PEI

Country; more than mud and asphalt
Country; flesh and blood of We
Country; contingent upon the
Commonwealth of family

Country; more than demographics
Country; more than war-fought fame
Country; more than sea of faces
For each face comes with a name

And each name comes with a purpose
And each purpose comes with pride
Pride and love for life and country
Like those who loved both and died

© Janet Martin

Real-ity Check!


In a perfect world we would never need to remember...
But pray we never forget
for History forgotten is History repeated!

 (photos from one of the memorial parks we visited; this one at the Port of Sydney)




That was real blood and mud and tears
That stabbed their teeth and eyes
So we can kiss curls
Of very real boys and girls
And sing them sweet lullabies

That was real fear and fire that burned
At the cost of a nation’s sons
So the future could stand
With a dream in their hand
Not the dread of loaded guns

That was real love and life that lay
‘neath the splay of smoke and sky
So this plot of loam
That we call home
Could raise freedom’s banner high

That was real horror; a glimpse of hell
Where the shell of bombs still stains
The fields and streets
Where commerce competes
On the ashes of what remains

That was real Now that shaped history
And the crosses of those who gave all
Where none have the ‘right’
With Freedom’s hind-sight
To pillage Past’s scar-stricken hall

That was real cost; where the price of war
Proves freedom is never free
And each drop we sip
From its Cup that we tip
Should foster gratuity

© Janet Martin