Freedom's Price is Steep

If only we only took time

to humbly and kindly love

If only we lived as if we believed

That what God/love gives is enough

***

Until we change our ways to God's ways, 

war will not change its ways

***

I have shared these excerpts from Peter Marshall's Sermon

The American Dream, a few times before

But truth is timeless!

The phrase below could just as well be read 'we in Canada' 😥🙏

Freedom’s price is steep where after-effects run deep; their loss, our gain

Freedom is never free, but a hard-fought and blood-wrought cross of pain

Love, the greatest command never fails; but kingdoms rise and fall

When leaders turn away and disobey God who is Lord of all

The Author and Authority of love is long-suff’ring and kind

Without Him we are a pathetic case of blind leading the blind

The wisdom of this world is sensual, demonic and of little worth

True hope and help is found in One alone; Maker of Heav’n and earth

Until we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, strength and mind

Freedom will fail. Travail of war will scream, blood red, dread’s streams unwind

God’s light shines on great darkness; a darkness that does not comprehend

The love of He who sets us free; whose death purchased life without end

If only we would take to heart the wage of disobedience

And would fear God, and love His Word, not treat Him with indifference

For ‘unto us a child was born, One whose kingdom will never cease

His Name, Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Prince of Peace

Freedom’s price is steep where after-effects run deep; His loss, our gain

Freedom is never free; His cost, a love-wrought, blood-bought cross of pain

Love, the greatest command never fails; great nations rise and fall

And will until all fear and believe in He who is Lord of all

© Janet Martin

Isa. 9:6

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: 

and the government shall be upon his shoulder: 

and his name shall be called Wonderful, 

Counsellor, 

The mighty God, 

The everlasting Father, 

The Prince of Peace.

More timeless truth from Jeremiah 

Who is wise and understanding among you?

 Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom.

  14But if you have bitter envy and [h]self-seeking in your hearts, 

do not boast and lie against the truth. 

15This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic.

  16For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. 

17But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, 

gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, 

without partiality and without hypocrisy. 

18Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace 

by those who make peace. 

James 3:13-18

At Life's Smorgasbord of Choices...

 

Life is not a big empty table like this one...

...before the guests arrived each with a freshly-baked delectable delight!

...turning the empty table into a smorgasbord of choices! 

Yesterday I was honored to host my mother's annual birthday tea.

All of her daughter's and daughter-in-laws are the annual guests;

this birthday tradition a long-standing, treasured highlight for all! 

Happy 81st birthday, dear Mother!

I am so thankful when weighing choices and responses/responsibilities

 that so many times without thinking I resort to 'what would mom do/say?'

And I know one of the answers was, is and will always be 'pray!' 

At life’s smorgasbord of choices

Desire is often tried

Where a host of friendly voices

Can make it hard to decide

Which to taste and which to turn from

Which to take and what to leave

For this is no feckless ho-hum

That our choices will achieve

…where each life is like a courtship

Between mortal and his/her Lord/lord

Exposing, through choice, true worship

Which in turn earns just reward

For, life’s smorgasbord of choices

When we listen, seems to be

Like a smorgasbord of voices

All shouting ‘pick me, pick me!’

Oho, there is no evasion

All are subject to reply

And we do; Delight’s elation

Is eager to satisfy

At life’s smorgasbord of choices

Replenished with each new day

Thus, because of all the voices

Wouldn’t it be wise to pray?

Pray for prudence and discretion

For hearts of humility

Where choice triggers a succession

Of choice-cruciality

Then, before we touch or savor

Today’s options, we should weigh

Their merit against God’s favor

And ask Him to lead the way

© Janet Martin

Phil.4:8

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, 

whatever is noble, 

whatever is right, 

whatever is pure, 

whatever is lovely, 

whatever is admirable—

if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—

think about such things.

Now! on a more mundane note I must choose between

doing up some apples to applesauce

or

apple pie-filling

or

Clean and bag more potatoes

or sort through those I have bagged

because they are very rot-prone this year

due to all the rain we had.

November Is The Poet's Bliss...

The poet's bliss is November...

Sentimental hues arouse...

Warmth from autumn’s waning embers...

Wafting from nigh-barren boughs...

Where the brittle corn rows shimmer

Weighed with final harvest-boon...

Where the revived pastures glimmer

Green as green as middle-June...

Where the heavy heavens splinter

With inklings of snowflake song...

Where the emptiness of gardens...

Lines canning shelves, row on row...

The poet's bliss is November

Sentimental hues arouse

Warmth from autumn’s waning embers

Wafting from nigh-barren boughs

Where the brittle corn rows shimmer

Weighed with final harvest-boon

Where the revived pastures glimmer

Green as green as middle-June

Where the heavy heavens splinter

With inklings of snowflake song

And the kiss of Old Man Winter

Starts to flirt with old and young

Where the emptiness of gardens

Lines canning shelves, row on row

And the chores that summer pardons

Are tackled with gusto now

The poet’s bliss is November

Something in its brooding bent

Fills the poet with the splendor

Of a heart, humbly content

© Janet Martin

The poet’s bliss is November

Something in its brooding bent

Fills the poet with the splendor

Of a heart, humbly content...

Psalm 69:30

I will praise God’s name in song

and exalt Him with thanksgiving.

Collections of Bit By Bit

PAD Challenge-day 7:

Two-for-Tuesday prompt. 

Write to one prompt, both prompts, 

and/or combine them: 

Write a big poem, or...

Write a small poem.

Life roads/loads can seem impossible/impassable when viewed in a lump sum...

Sometimes, as a loved one bears a cross, 

 oh, how we wish we could

bear or ease it for them but we cannot, and should not! 

(sometimes we wish we could rid ourselves of our own crosses!)

 Only beneath life's crosses

does faith become stronger and humbler/meeker💗🙏

But we can and should pray for God's sufficient grace 

to be the strength in our weakness!!

2 Cor.12:9

And He said to me,

 “My grace is sufficient for you, 

for My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

Life roads/loads can seem impossible/impassable when viewed in a lump sum

Its weight of cares can topple the most hopeful optimist

For none can see what waits to be, what is ‘what-ifs’ outcome

What favor or calamity the hour may untwist

What detour must be taken or what leap of learning tried

What perseverance shaken or what darling wish denied

But one breath, one step, one moment and one prayer at a time

The feeble can scale mountains and great burdens can be borne

Courage can face the giant where faith’s steppingstones align

To make us more reliant on the Author of each morn

As we press on toward the place where troubles cease their cry

As step by step and grace by grace He whispers ‘here am I’

A small word of kindness begins ripple effects of cheer

Tis step by step, the victor wins the title victors claim

Moment by moment unravels seasons, marked year by year

And draws each road we travel back to He, from whence we came

Do not despair, the Whole of It, when analyzed will show

Life's collections of bit by bit, as by God’s grace we go

© Janet Martin

In the Sweet By and By

John 1:16

And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.

How Is It (that as Time goes by I do not come apart?)

Catch a Falling Star...

PAD Challenge. day 4: For today’s prompt, write a catching poem.

This is one of those poems that threatened to go into full gallop

unless I reined it in...

They get caught on last, little leaves still clinging to tree-limbs

And on dusk’s fading fringes, as eventide’s tableau dims

And on the corner of the street each time you board the bus

As love’s tether learns to weather the Apartness of Us

They snag on echo-wisps and on November’s brooding gray

And on a phantom frame filled with pictures of Yesterday

A tender memory of suppertime for at least six

Before I was acquainted with Time’s age-old bag of tricks

They catch on freckled noses and on orchards, doffed of fruit

And on the wind that moans outside the door, like a bold brute

And on the close-cropped counterpane of harvest gathered in

On the moon as it pins the sky with lopsided half-grin

They tangle in the awkward angles of a child, half-grown

And catch on flakes of first snowfall, on milkweed silk, wind-blown

And on the notes of vintage melodies at Christmas time

And on the big clock tower at the hour’s solemn chime

On gardens as they slumber after pummeling of feet

After summer-sweet laughter begets ballads, bittersweet

After Autumn has yielded to the order of the earth

After the spoil of toil displays the fruit of labor’s worth

…on four-season masterpieces delighting ardent gaze

On wonder’s unpredictable and unexpected ways

On commonplace, second-to-none familiarity

On silhouettes etched on sunsets, on Baby on my knee

On petals as the prime of bloom is siphoned from the stem

On the slow-but-sure weaning of youth’s teen-green diadem

On so much more than page can hold, or poetry can tell

On gladness of hello and on the sadness of farewell

How is it that as time goes by, I do not come apart

As often as life’s catches at the strings around my heart

© Janet Martin

A tender memory of suppertime for at least six

Before I was acquainted with Time’s age-old bag of tricks...

Better Be Careful, Poet...

PAD Challenge day 6: For today’s prompt, take the phrase "Better (blank),"

replace the blank with a new word or phrase,

make the new phrase the title of your poem,

and then, write your poem...

Because of the rain and the end to Daylight Saving Time,

darkness began to fall at 5:00 p.m.!

Dusk’s darkness drops an ethereal veil over the countryside

The night rolls in, an ocean driv’n by an invisible tide

You better be careful, Poet; November can cast a spell

And set beneath its brooding deep, a bottomless inkwell

The day dissolves, a little like a snowflake on Time’s tongue

It covers every window where November’s landscape hung

You better be careful, Poet; for the heart is easy prey

When standing on dusk’s shoreline watching daylight ebb away

© Janet Martin

(Love's) Better Poetry

PAD Challenge day 6: For today’s prompt, take the phrase "Better (blank)," 

replace the blank with a new word or phrase, 

make the new phrase the title of your poem, 

and then, write your poem.

This take on today's poem-prompt 

was inspired by yesterday's photo-session;

the aim being to get a few good ones

(aka everyone looking forward with eyes open!!) 

for a page in a family calendar for my parents for Christmas

You are the laugh-lines that I earn

And collect thankfully

As by the grace of God I learn

Love's Better Poetry

You overflow my cup of joy

Filling love's crooks and curves

With happiness, dear girl and boy

More than one heart deserves 

You are my gentlest lullaby

My tenderest of care

And each, the apple of my eye

And each, my humblest prayer

You are heaven-to-earth's caress 

You are my home-sweet-home

You are more holy thankfulness

Than pen can ever poem

© Janet Martin

Getting to the Root of the Problem...

 PAD Challenge day 3: For today’s prompt, write a problem poem. 

Below an excerpt from Peter Marshall's sermon-

Keeper of the Springs

(and this was in the 1940's!!)

One cannot fix a problem until one pinpoints the source

But one ought to note symptoms that should trouble you and I

For epidemic-proportion-populace on a course

Of Ignorance to Truth, where empty churches testify

A somber lack of reverence and interest and care

For the Great Certainty for which we all ought to prepare

...and so tis no small wonder that things go from bad to worse

 In laws of twisted logic of confusion gone berserk

Where right is wrong and wrong is right and God, a name they curse

And well-intended master-plans of Fix-it just don't work

In a world doomed to madness as they seek but cannot find

Hope's everlasting gladness that yields joy and peace of mind 

When truth is seen as lies and lies are heralded as truth

It is because the Word of God is trodden underfoot

Then darkened understanding errs and bears pitiful proof;

Denial of the problem that yields problematic fruit

And gross incomprehension of the sad state we are in;

Because they/we do not recognize the root problem of sin 

The problem is not war or poverty, but hate and greed

A proud and unrepentant heart, thinking, utterly flawed

A negligent apathy to sin's subtle, deadly seed

In seeking first this world rather than the kingdom of God

Where empty churches gape and children/people traipse toward a Goal

Ignorant of Love's problem-solving Saviour of the Soul 

Sad problem this; too many homes where God's Word has no place

And homes where the Bible is but a book upon a shelf

Ignoring that apart from God, there is no saving grace

Apart from the Vine the branch is a Dead Thing by itself

Revealing that the culprit in this problem's quandary

Until we surrender to God, is always you and me 

© Janet Martin

Rom.1:16-17

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, 

because it is the power of God 

that brings salvation to everyone who believes: 

first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. 

17 For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—

a righteousness that is by faith from first to last,[e] 

just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”[f]

So many do not know

or believe or care

about the day of redemption 

and reckoning drawing near...

Malachi 4:1-3

The Day of the LORD

(Zephaniah 1:7–18; 1 Thessalonians 5:1–11; 2 Peter 3:8–13)

1“For behold, the day is coming, burning like a furnace, 

when all the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble;

 the day is coming when I will set them ablaze,”

 says the LORD of Hosts.

 “Not a root or branch will be left to them.”

2“But for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness 

will rise with healing in its wings,a 

and you will go out and leap like calves from the stall.

  3Then you will trample the wicked, f

or they will be ashes under the soles of your feet 

on the day I am preparing,” 

says the LORD of Hosts.