We Pray For Traveling Mercies, Lord

1 John 5:14

This is the confidence we have in approaching God: 

that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

Last week we received a prayer-request from a family,

for traveling mercies as they departed to answer God's call to a far-off land.

They have now posted a picture of their safe arrival!

We rejoice and continue to pray for them as they adjust to a new country,

and for all of us, who are striving to heed God's calling, 

we pray for 'traveling mercies' 

until we reach our destiny, to be forever with the Lord!

We pray for traveling mercies Lord, where cares and heartaches press

For hope and confidence restored through Thy Word’s promises

For salvation to be our song no matter what we face

Lord, make us weak to make us strong through Thy sufficient grace

We plead for traveling mercies Lord, for eyes we fix on Thee

To run with endurance toward The Reward none can see

For the joy set before us be our strength and joy and crown

Until with the victorious we lay this body down

We pant for traveling mercies Lord; that you would quench our thirst

With Living Water of Thy Word where boundless well-springs burst

From Truth’s eternal Rock, through ages never overthrown

Though storm and battle wages naught can shift Thy Cornerstone

We need Thy traveling mercies Lord, to lead us through each mile

We need thy Holy Spirit’s Sword where smiling snares beguile

Where our feet would slip without angel-armies unfurled

To vanquish dread and fear and doubt with peace, not of this world

We pray for traveling mercies Lord; and trust in Thy reply

For all we ask according to Thy will, you satisfy

Then, though we do not know or see all that time may betide

We press toward Faith’s destiny by mercies You provide

…all we like sheep have gone astray, but Thou, by Thy Son’s blood

Have borne our grief and washed away sin’s curse in mercy’s flood

Thou, The Good Shepherd, kind and true hears Thy sheep’s humble prayer

As traveling mercies lead us through the pastures of Thy care

In Thy Name we pray,

Amen

© Janet Martin

Blessed Jesus, Hold My Hand

Let Us Run

Sharing this song again because it uses a favorite scripture of mine

I need to repeat over and over! 🙏💗👑

Memory-Book (in the Making)

A sticky, sweaty, cacophony of canning, sweet kiddoes,

 broken fridges and toilets, chubby baby,

bee-stings, muddy feet, larkspur-loveliness, 

lilts of laughter and oh-no-groans 

new and renewed resolves,

among this week's memories!

Gramma, do you have any freethies (freezies) left?

Gramma, what stinks?!! (bread and butter-pickle-canning)

Baby-snuggles and squishes...

Thunder/rain/wind storms...

Bee sting...

 snakes and ladders...

No complex paradigm

No exorbitant fee

Only a moment’s worth of time

To make a memory

The sparkle of spent day

Wafts on the eventide

The mist of moments borne away

In memories to reside

A surreal picture-show

Filling frame after frame

A collection of high and low

Life’s snakes and ladders game

…where noise of girls and boys

Of choice and consequence

Unravels amidst childhood’s joys

Youth’s garb of Innocence

Ah, sweet and sacred surge

Of emerging daybreak

Today is poised upon the verge

Of memories to make

...as dawn sets new day free

Before Have turns to Had

Let’s make the kind of memory

That makes each other glad

And never overlook

Fresh opportunity

Soon turned to pictures in a book

That only thought can see

...and never to forget

From whence love's blessings come

And to keep close the Sacred Yet

Of life's eternal Sum

© Janet Martin

Dusk-bean picking and flower-delighting!

Love, or the Lack Thereof...

Jesus, Strong and Kind

Clash of wills when expectations don’t see eye to eye

Word that kills, when untamed tongue wounds with spite’s quick reply

Cup that overflows with sorrow when love is not kind

When love does not ‘suffer long’, with Other first in mind

Hunger is a heart-shaped hollow; want unsatisfied

When we cannot seem to swallow self-important pride

When we find no creature comfort in love’s common test

…of so much to learn about love’s good, better and best

Gentle joy and sweet contentment are love’s fruits, my dear

When forgiveness, not resentment keeps the conscience clear

When the welfare of another sets thought’s tender tone

Aware we leave either stumbling block or stepping stone

To love as we ought to, is impossible to do

Without the example of Love’s Author, kind and true

He is slow to anger, rich in mercy, gracious, good

What a way to live; to love each other as we should

God, who gave the Best He had because He loves us so

Does not leave as helpless, hopeless; by His grace we go

As His love pours through us it transforms wrong attitude

Until all that remains is love's law of gratitude 

© Janet Martin

There Is One Gospel

Psalm 145:8-9

The LORD is gracious and compassionate,

slow to anger and abounding in loving devotion.

9The LORD is good to all;

His compassion rests on all He has made.

(Bygone's) Building Blocks

But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,

Phil.3:13

..like empty jars

 

today's blush bars gleam with forms not yet filled

(below; yesterday's 'blush bars' because today's 'blush' was gray)

Victoria and I are hoping for a rainy day! It's been s-o-o-o-o long since we've had one!

Bygone; the sphere where yesteryear’s younger endearments waft

A metronome of steppingstones moss covered and mist-soft

Its stomping ground forever bound in volumes undeterred

Where brushstrokes of live, learn and love become a little blurred

Bygone; the age that preserves pages that are moment-laid

Where Now and Here will disappear to panoramas stayed

But, not quite yet; lest we forget to cherish what we hold

Before the sash of dust and ash snuffs today's splash of gold

Bygone; a world that is unfurled before our very eyes

A sea that slips through fingertips as moment-ships capsize

And drift into the silver-blue that seems to have no shore

But gathers in the groan and grin turned into days of yore

Bygone; futile to trace the isle of garnered live and learn

Better to take today and make it worth its no return

To trust the Hand that pours time’s sand-sparkles that soon will be

Fresh footfalls spilled to blocks that build Bygone’s Eternity

....like empty jars today's blush bars gleam with forms not yet filled

Where God allots life's varied jots and joys with which to build 

Then pray that we, with kind humility of servanthood

When day is done have made Bygone as lovely as we could 

© Janet Martin

Here's hoping today's footfalls spill into filled canning jars by tonight!

Before The Blue Tableau (of that which is no more)

"Rest is not idleness,

and to lie sometimes on the grass on a summer day,

 listening to the murmur of water,

or watching the clouds float across the sky,

is hardly a waste of time."

- John Lubbock

For some reason this summer

 it is taking serious discipline to press 'pause' for a bit!

As August arrived I panicked suddenly realizing I have hardly

stopped to soak in Sweet Idleness

if only for 15 minutes!

Rest is not idleness

Then pause the cause of Task

and linger where the sparkle of

summer

pours from a flask

through flower-bower-flues

where soon petal flares fall

and children that were half past two

have grown so very tall

 

Rest is not idleness

 Beneath the sprawling sky

earth showcases momentous

blips of 

seasons slipping by

through laughter and lament

Oh, may it never be

that we were always too care-bent

to rest beneath a tree

Rest is not idleness

Then, though toil's demands press

How sweet it is 

to sit a bit in

idle happiness

to feel the ebb and flow

of Here and Now before

it adheres to the blue tableau

of that which is no more

Janet Martin

Be still,

and know that I am God

Ps.46:10

Ah! These Are August Days...(Part 1)

There is something extremely evocative in

the sequence of wheat harvest, 

as fields rippling with golden oceans of grain 

dwindle 

to rows of straw 

to sweeps of stubble, 

...erupting within,

 a tango of euphoria and lament...

These are the days of dusty haze as wheat fields disappear...

These are the isles of sun-flow’r smiles before time takes its toll

And bows the head as weathered threads unravel ‘round the soul...

Of children wishful, blindly blissful to past’s bulging cheeks...

 of bare feet, fancy-free...

(and a glimpse of why one little girl sports band-aids on both knees

almost all summer long)😉😅

These are the days of dusty haze as wheat fields disappear

Staccato fire of cricket choir’s veiled, vibrato veneer

Of tasseled corn and love song’s torn twixt rapture and lament

Because the gait of summer’s fate becomes more evident

This is the hour of flower-gardens bursting at the seams

Of baskets heaped with harvest reaped; of living winter’s dreams

Of blankets tossed beneath green-glossed, leaf-embossed canopy

Of stolen breath at life and death’s ingrained velocity

These are the isles of sun-flow’r smiles before time takes its toll

And bows the head as weathered threads unravel ‘round the soul

While fingers linger, tracing faces kissed with mist and dew

Aware of how the air of Now spills thieves of gold and blue

…of monotone cicada drone, of bare feet, fancy-free

The wilding rush as roadsides blush with footloose filigree

Of chicory and loosestrife sea, sow-thistle, hollyhock

Of Queen Ann’s lace to frill and grace the most commonplace frock

Of silk-soft breeze lolling in trees, of hazy, lazy noon

Sidewalks sizzle, days drizzle like gold honey from a spoon

Of fellow fishing, willow swishing sluggish, shallow creeks

Of children wishful, blindly blissful to past’s bulging cheeks

Where duty spars with beauty’s marvelous mid-summer splash

As prudence teases students where wanderlust and work clash

As happiness says 'yes-yes-yes!' while time’s finesse says 'no!'

…momentous molds of holding on to moments letting go

Of gilt-edged dusk, Canadian-Tuscany flavoured fare

Much prayed for rain as cloud-freight trains go thundering through the air

The days when nature’s cello plays in every nook and crook

Where noses lose their way in flower-fray and story book

Ah, these are August Days. Hooray! Of heaven-on-earth feel

These are the frames that twilight claims and yet can never steal

This is the page that sets the stage for poetry run wild

These are the days that summer plays as if she were a child

© Janet Martin

Of gilt-edged dusk...

Much prayed for rain as cloud-freight trains go thundering through the air...

Where noses lose their way in flower-fray...

 and story book...

Love; The Journey

So much for love to hope for, pray for, and celebrate!

Love is not a feeling, 

but a fulltime labor of compassion, courage, correction and grace!

Love is ever learning and never lazy.

Love is God poured out, in/ through us!

His  loving grace is sufficient for the charge!

1 John 4:7-12

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, 

and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 

8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 

9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, 

that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 

10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us 

and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 

11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 

12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, 

God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

1 Cor.13:7-8

Love...bears all things, 

believes all things, 

hopes all things, 

endures all things.

Love never fails.

I believe in loving the journey 

but an apt twist to this quote would be

Love is the Journey

Love hurts with those who hurt

And laughs with those who laugh

Its noble motive seeks the worth

Of fellowman’s behalf

It hopes and prays and cares

And does not weigh the price

But with a heart of mercy bears

The yoke of sacrifice

Love does not seek its own

Agendas; love is kind

It sets a stable stepping stone

For those foll’wing behind

It heeds earnest rebuke

Love does not boast or lie

Unprejudiced, humble and true

Love measures thought’s reply

Love mourns with those who mourn

And sings with those who sing

Love shares the rose and bears the thorn

Without self-pitying

Love lights joy’s candlestick

Love never, never fails

When grief’s sickle cuts to the quick

God, who IS love prevails

Incarnate and Enough

The Vine sustains the branch

Apart from God, love is not love

But hell's hopeless romance

Love transcends circumstance

Mercy's unthwarted grail

Outpours, in constant sustenance

The love that cannot fail

So, Love the journey Here

With humble, holy laud

Because love is the journey, dear

Back to love's birthplace; 

God

© Janet Martin

John 15:5

“I am the vine; you are the branches. 

If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; 

apart from me you can do nothing.

1 Cor.13:13

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. 

But the greatest of these is love.

Rainbow-Feast

She pulls a rainbow from her garden

Savours every shade

Because a rainbow from the garden

Is the best feast ever made

Thank-you, God!

© Janet Martin