To We Who Still with Faith Behold...

Yesterday we (mom, dad and their family of ten plus spouses, children, grandchildren and great-grand children) enjoyed our annual Christmas get-together.

It is is the tradition in our family to sing in the afternoon, and oh, for some reason those old Christmas songs seemed new as we sang their timeless Truth of hope and love and joy and peace!

Oh, pray we never weary of

The wonder of our Saviour’s love

Nor cease His peace and joy to bring

As worship to our Lord and King

Ages cannot annul His might

Or dim the fullness of His light

Jesus, with faith let us behold

Love’s story that cannot grow old

From God His Father came I AM

Sinless, to be for sin a lamb

The babe in Bethlehem, for us

Became salvation on a cross

Jesus, then let us never cease

To sing of joy and hope and peace

And pray we never weary of

The wonder of You and your love

© Janet Martin

A Bitty Ditty on the Order of Supremacy

 Isn't it nice to know we pray to From Everlasting-to-Everlasting God?!

Last night's before-sleep prayer seemed like a pathetic mish-mash 

of worship, worry, wonder and want,
then I remembered my mother's encouraging words from years ago...
'when you don't know how to pray Jesus gave us a perfect prayer" 

and I murmured these sacred, ancient, ever-relevant words

Matt.6:9-13

After this manner therefore pray ye:
 Our Father which art in heaven, 
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, 
Thy will be done in earth, 
as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, 
as we forgive our debtors.
 And lead us not into temptation, 
but deliver us from evil: 
For thine is the kingdom, 
and the power, 
and the glory, 
for ever. 
Amen.

Time is the father of days

And days, the father of years

And years, the father of every day

We hold that disappears

Father in Heaven, pray we

Recognize Thy Deity

For Thou wert Father

Before Time began

And Thou art Father

Forever, Amen

© Janet Martin

Calm Is The Morn...

 Yesterday Morning...

 This morning...

Calm is the morn from future rent

A beaming trace of He where none

Have seen the Light that lights the sun

And contends with man’s discontent

The universe His order heeds

Man’s will seems disposed to oppose

The hand that bends the bud with rose

And fathers mercy for his needs

How doth one teach the heart to trust

Or fathom soul’s eternity

Where none can decipher or see

Save He who forms this rebel-dust

…and splays across seasons of time

Morn over morn, from nail-scarred lathe

He presses grace to messy faith

And cups the ladder that we climb

We like to behold with the eye

It goes against man’s nature so

To trust the Unseen and let go

Of what we deem would satisfy

This mist we kiss then reminisce

Often remiss without intent

No wistful wish can circumvent

Or deter from its Promises

The spectrum of infinity

No one can grasp or understand

The earth is like a speck of sand

Pulsing with Immortality

Calm is the morn from future gleaned

And hinged to Eon’s Ever-tide

Where years will yield their prize and pride

And Soul from dust-cajole is weaned

Then teach us to number each day

Lest, when we touch Mercy, nail-scarred

This dust-to-dust is caught off guard

Oh, God forbid it ends this way

© Janet Martin

Siesta-song

Earth is like a frozen casket

Covered in a shroud of snow

Earth is like a flower-basket

Filled with violet under-tow

Earth is like a still-life painting

Sparse, the tint from Artist’s tray

Earth is like a garden waiting

While green takes a holiday

Earth is like an open chapel

Roof of sky and latticed limb

Earth is like Bethlehem’s stable

Where we come to worship Him

Earth is like a feather pillow

Earth is like a star-strewn deep

Earth is like a blue lake billow

-ing with roses fast asleep

© Janet Martin

Happy Friday-Friday-Friday... !!!
Fifteen sleeps 'til Christmas!

Like a Phoenix

Alas, this day comes with trouble

Grief and pain as yet unborn

Hope and heartache intermingled

From time’s virgin offspring, Morn

Hallelujah, this day surges

Like a thoroughfare un-trod

Like a phoenix, it emerges

From the faithful hand of God

© Janet Martin