Try As We May

 Truly touching articles in this latest issue of Rural Route!
Thank-you to everyone who allowed us a peek into your lives/hearts!
It really does remind us to remember those with heavy, daily crosses to bear!
Many of our other 'local heroes' are not featured in these articles and we remember you as well...
I was startled to realize within a five miles radius from our home are four husbands/dads living the remainder of their lives in wheel-chairs!
 (Wayne Martin, Doug Weber and Ralph Martin besides Robert who is the Front Cover photo)
...our hearts and prayers go out to them, their wives/families!

Below is part of the story from a young girl who is watching as her friends get driver's licenses. etc...
(Esp. touching to me as my niece is one of her faithful friends)

Warning; paragraph below may cause tear-flow💕

Some things we suffer will not go away

Nothing will alter it; try as we may

Still, not for nothing, the trouble life sends

This binds us nearer to fam’ly and friends

This shines the light of Love’s beam, true and dear

This ushers pity of God through each tear

This teaches us through the Yielding of Plan

 Of a Creator much greater than man

Who knows the mind of God? Not you or me

Who knows what trial is waiting to be?

But this we rest in; no matter the test

God, rich in mercy allows what is best

Man, poor in spirit will be Heaven-blessed

Man who is mourning will be comforted

Man who is meek will inherit the earth

Faith waits until fulfillment bares its Worth

Try as we may we are not in control

God is the Giver of body and soul

He, our Father loves us, one and all

Tender, the Mender of Man and The Fall

He, through His suffering and by His death

Brings to man’s suffering, hope in each breath

So we rejoice as we trust in the Lord

Heaven is waiting with sorrow’s reward

© Janet Martin

 But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you,
for my power is made perfect in weakness."
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses,
so that Christ's power may rest on me.
2 Cor.12:9

Simple Symbols....

Such simple symbols to remember the most sacred sacrifice ever!

Just a bit of broken bread, Lord

Just a solemn sip of wine

To remember what You suffered

For this sin-cursed soul of mine

To recall Your crucifixion

Where your sinless blood ran free

In a river of redemption

For the soul’s recovery

Just a couple simple symbols

Tasted in obedience

Lest forbid, we forget Jesus

Bearing death’s deliverance

Broken bread for broken body

Wine for His divine blood shed

This we do in awed remembrance

Until Bride with Groom is wed

© Janet Martin

Hello Again After An Unexpected Break!

Due to a power-surge a few days ago we were suddenly out of internet...
back on this morning after they figured out our router simply needs to be reset😊!
(reminded me if this 'chuckle')

This was the poem I was posting when the power-surge went through...

Early Morning Musing Whilst Dead-heading Flowers

Now the hour is a vendor and the flower is a sigh

As it scatters summer’s splendour where our footsteps hasten by

Stirring dust that softly settles leaving little to its name

Like the full bloom strews its petals and returns from whence it came

Now the moment metes the tempo in time’s unchained melody

Touch releases the memento that composes Memory

Love and longing compose lyrics for an audience of one

Vain to entertain hysterics for what cannot be undone

Now new day raises the curtain to earth’s awesome theater

Where nobody knows for certain what is about to occur

For this fling with fragile beauty kindles ire in a beast

Challenging the charge of Duty with fires of dreamer’s feast

Now the willing garden beckons like a poem without page

And the tiller of it reckons with the war before the wage

And the craving for sweet summer cannot satisfy its tooth

Where each twilight is a bummer where each blossom is a booth

Now the box that holds the presents we wished for on winter’s day

Unlocks a breath-stealing essence; Death stalking its primal prey

And the rose we hinged our hopes on startles us with thorny socks

Darling, so it goes, each season has both caress and hard knocks

Now the hour is a vendor, we, contenders of its stock

Born to become seasoned spenders on the circle of the clock

Where the Bud unfolds its pinion in a fugitive salute

Then falls prey to the Dominion that nobody can refute

© Janet Martin

Concerning This Salvation Then...

This is a poem for we who believe to persevere with joy

for once we were lost!

...and for those who choose to live without Hope, to count the cost! 

Faith feels its way along the grace

That leads us to hope’s resting place

The battleground of righteousness

Is plagued with enemy’s 'success'

Yet hedged in by One who sustains

And counts earth’s loss for heaven’s gains

Do not despair where cynics lie

God hears our prayer and heeds our cry

And He for Whom we hope and hurt

For whom we sacrifice and work

For whom we know we have believed

Is able; victory achieved

Therefore, armed with triumph foretold

We are called to be strong and bold

For we serve, not some Unsure Thing

We serve a risen Lord and King

…where hope that is seen is not hope

And without it, how could we cope

How could we bear care’s dust-to-dust

If man was all man had to trust

Then hope would be a cheerless tryst

For godless hope cannot exist

And life would be Death’s dreadful toll

Without Hope’s Lord that saves the soul

Concerning this salvation then

Exalt the Living Hope of men

Where Time cannot undo the Truth

As we wait for hope’s living proof

When stars will fall like figs and hail

And all the earth will mourn and wail

As faith beholds The Proven Word

Upon the throne of Christ the Lord

© Janet Martin

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! 

In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope 

through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,  

 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. 

This inheritance is kept in heaven for you,  

 who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation

 that is ready to be revealed in the last time.  

In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while 

you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials.  

 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—

of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—

may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.  

 Though you have not seen him, you love him; 

and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him 

and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy,  

 for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

 Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, 

searched intently and with the greatest care...

1 Peter 1:3-10

Gold-diggers

We learn from little ones to mine for moment-gold!

None can afford to make less than the most of what we hold

The secret to true happiness is found in moment-gold

Through time’s incessant change we find some things remain intact

The more that we are thankful for, the less we seem to lack

The season after planting and before harvest runs rife

With that which appears common but becomes the best of life  

Where we, merchants of moment-gold are on a spending spree

…a once-in-a-lifetime investment opportunity

Futile to fret about the Yet that begets come-what-may

These little girls with pretty curls soon up and fly away

And curious boys so full of noise and wonder’s joys grow tall

Honing a mother’s hunger in the hurry of it all

So much to learn in the return of what time tries to teach

Where wisdom that we earn comes from lessons long out of reach

Where happiness we find must still be mined from moment-gold

Where it is not too late to make the most of what we hold

(last verse optional)

(the pitter-patter of bare feet soon paves a lost highway

futile to gaze down airborne streets through haze of yesterday

futile to pine for prizes pressed in morrow's mystic mold

better to make the most of today's precious moment-gold)

© Janet Martin

  Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have,

 because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”

Heb.13:5