Gifts Beyond My Reach to Give...

There are some gifts beyond our power to give...

No matter how much we wish we could

our part is but to pray we would all seek and find!

My dear, this Christmas if I could my gift to you would be

The assurance that comes from trust in more than we can see

The peace that passes understanding in this world of woe

Or joy unspeakable grounded in grace whereby we go

I’d like if you could unwrap hope to carry in your heart

To help you cope no matter what, its priceless work of art

Would draw you like a brilliant star when life is dark and cold

To seek and follow from afar like the wise men of old

My dear, I’d find the Perfect Gift and we would call it Love

And then no matter what life brings this gift would be enough

When disappointment dashes dreams or scars you in the fight

This love would minister to you like an angel of light

My dear, this Christmas if I could I’d bring these gifts to you

And pray that they would cheer life's way with courage kind and true

But these are gifts that you must seek and never can receive

Until your faith has made you whole with two words, I believe

© Janet Martin

 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--

and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--

Ephesians 2:8

A Something-to-Remember Sonnet on A Stormy Church-cancelled Sunday Morn...

 Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.

Gal.6:7

We reap what we sow, but we never see the full impact of the harvest!

Many who follow reap what we sow as well...

We leave behind, with grit of daily grind

Strewed on time’s path, the aftermath of choice

In ebb and flow of yes and no entwined

Where death may steal our breath, but not our voice

As consequence and recompense reply

Though you and I lie stilled in Bygone's glade

They grapple with the apple of hope’s eye

And wrestle on a trestle that we laid

This thus should stir in us a sacred quest

To consider more than the score of Now

For what seems small soon falls prey to the test

That tries the ties that bind us to time’s plow

Where what we sow will grow, then while we sleep

Beneath earth’s sash of dust and ash, they reap

© Janet Martin

Well We Know...or Are Learning To Know

Want without Jesus,will never be filled

Its tempest of longing will never be stilled

Acts. 4:12

 Salvation is found in no one else, 

for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind 

by which we must be saved."

Matthew 1:21
She will give birth to a Son, and you are to give Him the name Jesus, 

because He will save His people from their sins."
Acts 10:43
All the prophets testify about Him 

that everyone who believes in Him 

receives forgiveness of sins through His name."

A song to satisfy Want...

 

This is how God showed his love among us:
He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.
1 John 4:9

Well we know want wars with gladness

Haunts the hope that shores the heart

Daunts desire with deep sadness

And dejection’s stinging smart

Well the struggle for survival

Without God hones hard defeat

Joy, a sympathetic rival

Or a laughing hypocrite

Well we know we know so little

Save what we learn from the past

While the frond of youth grows brittle

As the bond of Truth holds fast

Well the trouble we encounter

Taunts the apple of Want's gain

Faith subjects us to a future

Where sight-blind we peer in vain

Well we know Want’s wage is worry

If we forge forth without God

His great timing none can hurry

Beneath Mercy’s bitter rod

Well we know Want is oft smitten

With the shallow scope of gaze

While the prize of hope is hidden

In God’s higher, perfect ways

Well we know heads full of knowledge

Fill rooms with noise-metered mist

If the heart is but a college

For the want-worn narcissist

© Janet Martin

Grateful...(Happy American Thanksgiving Day!)

At 3:00 I was still trying to decide what I could make for supper
that could cook while I put a second coat of paint on the 'purple room'! 

When in menu limbo thaw ground beef.
so I did; 2 lbs.

 While it thawed in the microwave I scrubbed a few potatoes
 then tried to decide what next.
I chose meat-loaf, with baked potato-wedges and butternut squash
because this could bake at alike temps.
I put the meatloaf in for 45 min@325F before adding the pan of squash-potato.
I left it at 325F for an hour then reduced the heat around 6;00
because on Thursdays no one is home before 6:30.
Second coat of paint was done by 6:00
allowing time to make a spinach salad to complete the menu.

Meatloaf

2 lbs ground beef thawed.

I small onion chopped

3 or 4 bread-crusts, crumbled

1 teaspoon each of salt and black pepper

2 eggs

squirt each of ketchup and mustard (according to taste)

2/3 cup milk

Mix and press in pan

Baking instructions above

 (if using a deep loaf pan bake covered for 11/2 hrs at 350 then uncover for the last 15 minutes.)

I topped this meatloaf with a BBQ sauce when I uncovered it

1/3 cup ketchup

1tbsp. br. sugar

1 tsp. chili powder

I tsp (heaping) honey mustard 

Cut clean, dry potatoes into wedges. 

Peel and slice squash into 1/2" rings

place in buttered casserole dish

 sprinkle salt and pepper to taste
as well as paprika and

parsley flakes or fresh chopped parsley

another drizzle of butter and enough water just to cover bottom of pan

Cover with foil and bake 1 hour at 325/350F

Remove foil for the last 15 min.

Spinach Salad

base of baby spinach

topped with thinly sliced red and green cabbage

celery, chopped

toasted sunflower seeds and sliced almonds

dried cranberries

Leave dressing on side

I used a soy-sauce dressing

the recipe for a full batch is;

Mississippi Salad dressing

put in blender 3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup vinegar

3 tbsp. soy sause

1 tbsp black pepper

blend then slowly add 3/4 cup oil

 (I use 1/4 cup olive oil and 1/2 cup canola or veg. oil)

put in glass bottle or jar.

Lightly drizzle salad

refrigerate unused dressing

Grateful for goodness that graces the table

Grateful for strength to do what I am able

Grateful for mercies renewed every morn

Fields that were laden with harvest, now shorn

Flicker of leaf-lanterns strewn ‘neath our feet

November’s embers where earth and sky meet

Grateful for love that gives heartstrings a tug

Wood fire warmth, like a welcome home hug

Seasons that stir us then startle us, oh

Swift gifted shimmer from first bud to snow

Teaching us tenderly as time goes by

To look the moment at hand in the eye

Grateful for touch, for hands still within reach

Grateful for much love’s demands seem to teach

Grateful for blessings too countless to name

(God, my forgetfulness puts me to shame)

Day made for labour and night deigned for rest

Purpose that bids us strive to give our best

Grateful that God always faithful and true

Never stops caring for me and for you

Grateful to know His ways are always good

Even when His grace is misunderstood

Grateful, when trouble and heartache assails

To know no matter what, love never fails

© Janet Martin

Colossians 3:17
And whatsoever ye do in word or deed,

 do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, 

giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

No Quick Fix...

Yesterdays poem-a-day challenge was its traditional final two-for-Tuesday;

 Write a love poem or write an anti-love poem. 

Love was never made strong enough to bear what might be, only what is. 

Love never fails.

this morning love was treated to a good chuckle.

Little Girl arrived, proudly bearing gifts!

From a purple polka-dot bag she produced

...a cold hotdog?!!

Her mother explained that at supper last night she insisted on saving one for Janet

and she wanted to put it in her purple polka-dot bag like a real present!😁

Ah irony of love; it heals and wounds,

...a reel of laughter and tears

There is no quick fix for the heart

For all the hurt love heals

Just like the rose, hope’s thorn-pricks smart

Beneath beauty’s appeal

And could we count the cost and care

That composes love’s rod

T’would seem a charge, too large to bear

But by the grace of God

Love suffers long and it is kind

It tugs and strains heart-strings

Yet balances its tear-prayer grind

With the laughter it brings

Love never fails; where grin and groan

Composes its discourse

As carriages of skin and bone

Transport us to its Source

...and no quick fix can mend the glove

Worn thin with mercy’s Must

Where He is faithful who IS Love

Thus, step-by-step we trust

© Janet Martin