Hallelujah Fount (because we need its Certainty in these Uncertain Times)

This song that Victoria was listening to this morning...

and this verse  I read in my morning reading...

For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.
John 1:16 ESV or NLT version
From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another

 ...helped inspire today's poem...

because let's face it; it takes more than the piece/peace of pie to turn panic to peace!

When we begin to count

Blessings bestowed, unfurled

We feel a hallelujah-fount

Drown the fear of this world

As we begin to see

With kinder, meeker stance

The philharmonic symphony/sympathy

That mercy’s Maestro grants

Where we are not alone

To face the foe of dread

Where God is still upon His throne

Yet with us every step

Where seasons keep their pace

And grace is never swayed

In spite blessings we disgrace

And messes we have made

Where we live in moments

Of one day at a time

Where we are the recipients

Of promises divine

For no man here on earth

Can fully reassure

Without God’s Word to instill truth

Whereby we will endure

And then, as we believe

Speech becomes dumb with awe

Where we were numb now we perceive

The wonder of love’s law

And how God sees our need

Beyond the present fuss

And works ahead to intercede

On the behalf of us

His light of Righteousness

A lamp unto our feet

His hope through divine promises

To make the bitter sweet

His Beauty marred and scarred

With testaments of pride

Where love trod a road cruel and hard

And then was crucified

…to pay the debt we owed

To defeat death and hell

To prove the Sovereignty of God

With the tomb’s empty shell

Where we, unto this day

May touch those Hands engraved

With the insignia of grace

By His name we are saved

Ah! Then the blessing-fount

Thought cannot comprehend

As humbly we begin to count

His mercies without end

Where Heaven’s Finale

Is worth earth’s short travail

While we lean on His Guarantee

Of love that will not fail

© Janet Martin

Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.
1 Thess.5:11

another awesome song...

On Finding Happiness (and keeping it)

 Here's to Finding Happiness, wherever we are!
This verse takes on special significance right now;

Whoever gives heed to instruction prospers,
and blessed is the one who trusts in the LORD
Prov.16:20

Hopefully we are all doing our best part to heed the instructions we are given;
whether for physical health and safety due to Corona V. or
for our spiritual well-being due
to mortal bodies being instilled with Immortal Soul!

 It was a simple chili and salad supper;

simply browned 2lbs. beef, added precooked beans from the freezer (black, navy and kidney) 

and 1 large jar of homemade canned marinara sauce.

Happiness is not something we can force by sheer command

The secret to its blessing we must always find firsthand

A balance of surrender, strength, blindness and open gaze

Gathered into a heart of humble thankfulness and praise

Happiness can’t be purchased (though sometimes we think it can)

So we stretch our purse-strings to accommodate the plan

Alas; the glass that gleamed with dreamy Brigadoon-spheres breaks

And spills what turns to wisdom as we learn through our mistakes

The irony of happiness keeps us in constant awe

Where greed and discontentment complicate its simple law

Where need opens a doorway to a world of sweet surprise

As we discover undercover blessings in disguise

Happiness is no fancy feast or ‘gorge-yourself’ buffet

The greatest to the least can find its kind hip-hip-hooray

As we become more thankful then less reluctant to give

Happiness by the heart-full spills into the life we live

© Janet Martin

For Our Slew Of Need

 this poem was inspired by a slew of prayer requests in my in-box this morning

 for the slew of man's needs.

Below, a handful of verses from a Book full of Truth!
 
Psalm 9:9
The LORD is a refuge for the oppressed,
 a stronghold in times of trouble.

Psalm 46:1
God is our refuge and strength, 
an ever-present help in trouble.

Psalm 59:16
But I will sing of Your strength 
and proclaim Your loving devotion in the morning. 
For You are my fortress, my refuge in times of trouble.

Psalm 62:8
Trust in Him at all times, O people; 
pour out your hearts before Him.
 God is our refuge. 
Selah

Psalm 81:1
Sing for joy to God our strength; 
make a joyful noise to the God of Jacob.

Psalm 145:18
The LORD is near to all who call on Him, 
to all who call out to Him in truth.

For our help in times of trouble

For our laughter and our tear

For the place where courage struggles

God our Father, You are here

For hope’s hunger and its heartbreak

For the mountain and the vale

For your love that does not forsake

Father-God, Your Name we hail

For the deep waters and shallow

For the battle and the drill

For the place where faith would wallow

Your Voice whispers, Peace, be still

For the days of health and sickness

For the way we cannot see

For the grace that keeps and quickens

God our Father, We thank Thee

For the promise of Your presence

For the testaments of faith

For Your Word to cheer and strengthen

Father-God, we lift our praise

For You, forever and ever

Are in full, perfect control

You hold the sickle that severs

Breath of life from deathless soul

For that Hour's preparation

Let us labour in Thy grace

Until Triumph's celebration

God our Father, face to face 

© Janet Martin

Soon...

 For the second day in a row Little Girl sang

"this is the best day!'

as her toes seemed to touch the sky!

Aw! why do they have to grow up so soon?!!

Seems so surreal sometimes

…that one syllable, soon

That tests the measure of faith’s grind

With morning, night and noon

Sometimes it seems abstract

As we peer t'ward its ‘when’

While common matters made of fact

Crowd days from now-to-then

‘Soon we will this-or-that

We whisper to thin air

While, all the while past grows so fat

On heaps of here-to-there

Soon…what a little word

That dams a tide of glints

As moments leave a lifetime blurred

In echo-shaped imprints

Soon we will leave behind

Both highlight and dark dread

For that which soon we all will find

Exactly as God said

For Soon is never far

Thus, so sacred because

The very place that we still are

Will soon be that which was

Therefore we ought to give

‘Soon’ more than a slight nod

This little life that we still live

Will soon return to God

© Janet Martin

It Is Spring

 The words we've been longing to taste...

"Happy Spring, everyone!"

Soon we will stroll and loll in rooms walled in with trees and flowers

Once more betaken with the plumes that weathered winter’s hours

We’ll kick off shoes and revel in the goodness of the earth

For it is Spring; and so begins the season of new birth

And we will walk the garden path where lark and robin sings

Where winter-long’s subsided wrath hosts hope’s green featherlings

Where old and young are not so far apart in heart and soul

For it is spring; and so begins the bloom-tides tender toll

The sod is strummed by fingers we can sense but never see

Where God is like the Maestro and nature, The Symphony

And we, ah, we are like a sunbeam-song-starved audience

Eager for diamond-dazzled streams and wild grass festooned fence

Eager to linger for a moment longer, just because

The land is green, the sky is blue where world of winter was

Eager to put to more than paper the caper of dreams

For it is spring and so begins life bursting at its seams

Soon we will be knee-deep in dells drifted with daisy-snow

Where gladness rings life’s laughter bells and willow-ballads blow

Where all we ever wished for seems a little less aloof

For it is spring and so begins Providence’s fresh proof  

© Janet Martin

Meanwhile the garden is still struggling to shed its mantle of snow...

But soon!

I can hear robins and killdeers claiming their territories.
(I hope they packed their winter coats just in case; this is Canada after all!)