Days of Preparation

On By Charis PsalloIn Photography4 Comments

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The horse is prepared for the day of battle,
    but the victory belongs to the Lord.

(Proverbs 21:31 NLT)

This morning Facebook reminded me of an old post I wrote when my granddaughter was about three years old. I enjoyed her ability to give directions around her city when I was babysitting for a few days.

“Go past the tower (tall building) and wait for the green light. Then turn and go past Costco and there it is – Walmart!”

This amused me, so when we needed groceries after her swimming lessons I asked for directions to Superstore.

“Nana, have you been to Superstore before?”

“Yes, dear.”

“Then look into your memory and you can find the way there all by yourself.”

Today I face another battle where the odds are seemingly against me. I’m doing much better at avoiding panic this time, but I needed this prompt to remind me to look into my memory and acknowledge the times when we did all we could – and it was not enough. But God took what ever preparations we made and did something greater than we ever could have imagined.

Resting in the Lord is not about passively flopping on the ground and awaiting rescue. We pick up our five smooth stones, gather as many empty vessels as we can, prepare a sacrifice on an altar, stand before Pharaoh’s armies with nothing but a stick, march around a city seven times, pick up our beds, walk all the way to Damascus to pray for a guy who wants to kill us. We make preparations, we prepare the horse for the day of battle (again), but we know that the victory belongs to the Lord.

That’s resting in the Lord too.

 

Ahead of You

On By Charis PsalloIn Fields, Mountains, Photography, SkyLeave a comment

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“God has foreordained the works to which He has called you. He has been ahead of you preparing the place to which you are coming and manipulating all the resources of the universe in order that the work you do may be a part of His whole great and gracious work.” – G. Campbell Morgan

Nevertheless

On By Charis PsalloIn Art, Uncategorized3 Comments

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I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20 KJV)

Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:4)

I don’t quote from the King James version very often, although it is the translation I grew up with. I find I end up having to explain it to people not familiar with archaic English anyway, so I might as well use a later version provided by scholars who have dedicated themselves to the task. But there is a dramatic poetry in the old language I sometimes miss.

Nevertheless…

Nevertheless I live.

Words that rock the world no matter the century or the dialect.

Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.

How deeply profound.

The Eyes of Eternity

On By Charis PsalloIn Photography, SkyLeave a comment

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Wonder blasts the soul – that is, the spiritual – and the skeleton, the body – the material. Wonder interprets life through the eyes of eternity while enjoying the moment, but never lets the moment’s revision exhaust the eternal.

– Ravi Zacharias

Tune My Heart

On By Charis PsalloIn Black and white, Just folks, Music, Photography, Uncategorized2 Comments

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For there’s nothing we can do to oppose the truth; all we can do is align ourselves with it. (2 Corinthians 13:8)

Lately I’ve run into a number of articles on sympathetic vibration in music. The other word that keeps grabbing my attention is alignment.

Sympathetic vibration can be demonstrated when a pitch fork is held near a string tuned to the same pitch. Without being touched the strings seem to come alive and respond with vibrations that play the same note.

I’ve heard it said that true worship begins in heaven and the heart that is still will pick it up. One of my favourite passages of scripture is found in the second chapter of Hosea. The Lord uses the metaphor of alluring his formerly wayward love to a desert place where there is no voice but His. He says that in that place, she will respond to Him. The New American Standard version uses the word sing.

“Therefore, behold, I will allure her,
Bring her into the wilderness
And speak kindly to her.
“Then I will give her her vineyards from there,
And the valley of Achor [trouble] as a door of hope.
And she will sing there as in the days of her youth…”

I’m beginning to see this as sympathetic vibration. When she hears The Voice singing the same pitch which she was designed to sing, the beloved comes alive. Her heart vibrates in sync with the sound that is at the heart of creation. Her heart resonates with Truth.

When we are in tune with the Father’s heart we are in alignment with His truth. When we are all in tune with Him we are also all in tune with each other.

A.W. Tozer wrote: “Has it ever occurred to you that one hundred pianos all tuned to the same fork are automatically tuned to each other? They are of one accord by being tuned, not to each other, but to another standard to which each one must individually bow. So one hundred worshipers met together, each one looking away to Christ, are in heart nearer to each other than they could possibly be, were they to become ‘unity’ conscious and turn their eyes away from God to strive for closer fellowship.”

Instruments in a symphony do not all sound the same. A violin is not a bassoon. Seldom does the composer ask an orchestra to play in unison. He asks them to play in harmony, but all the notes are based on one pure pitch and all play the same song. Worship begins in the Father’s heart. It is a gift He gives us so that we have something to give back to Him.

At the moment the divine orchestra – the Church – most often sounds a bit like everyone is concentrating on individual warm-up exercises and are all practising their own songs at the same time. Some have recently come in from the cold and their instruments are not yet in tune, but I have hope for the day when all look to the Conductor, tune to His perfect pitch, and unite to play the greatest song ever.

Soon.

Their sound will go out into all lands, even to the ends of the earth, when all creation joins to sing God’s praise.

In the meantime this is my prayer: Come play the strings of my heart, Lord. Tune my heart to sing Your praise.

Edited to add:

 

Snowy Field

On By Charis PsalloIn Fields, Photography, WinterLeave a comment

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“The situations you are in are not more powerful than God. They are not stronger than Him. There is light. There is truth. There is wisdom. There is revelation. There is hope. There is joy. There is peace in believing.”

~Graham Cooke

We Don’t Hass to be Afraid

On By Charis PsalloIn Black and white, Photography2 Comments

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Don’t be afraid, I am with you;
don’t give way, for I am your God.
I strengthen you and I help you;
I uphold you with the right hand
of my justice. (Isaiah 41:10)

Don’t be afraid,
for I have redeemed you.
I have called you by your name,
you are mine. (Isaiah 43:1)

When he was only two years old and his daddy appeared to be dying in the hospital our little grandson looked into his Mommy’s eyes and said, “We don’t hass to be afraid. We don’t hass to be afraid, Momma, ’cause Jesus is wiss us!”

Sometimes when I look at all the things in my character that need fixing I feel overwhelmed. The word I feel the Lord has given me for this year is “instill.”  I want the concepts I have learned about the goodness of God and how much he loves me to be instilled in my heart so my first reaction is trust. I get there eventually but my “knee-jerk reactions” need revision before I open my mouth. When I wonder how long it will take I remember the reaction of a child barely old enough to talk.

Sometimes this journey is not as much about overcoming obstacles as returning to the faith of a child. Restoration is recovering the pure undivided heart of a little one who knows what it is to trust.

Yesterday my grandson’s Daddy taught him how to skate. He learned to balance and glide and turn on the ice rink Daddy built for his children in the backyard. There was much joy!

For the Eternal Alone

On By Charis PsalloIn Animals, Flowers, Photography, UncategorizedLeave a comment

IMG_3447 monarch butterfly

 

I am pleading with the Eternal for this one thing,
my soul’s desire:
To live with Him all of my days—
in the shadow of His temple,
To behold His beauty and ponder His ways
in the company of His people.

His house is my shelter and secret retreat.
It is there I find peace in the midst of storm and turmoil.
Safety sits with me in the hiding place of God.
He will set me on a rock, high above the fray.

God lifts me high above those with thoughts
of death and deceit that call for my life.
I will enter His presence, offering sacrifices and praise.
In His house, I am overcome with joy
As I sing, yes, and play music for the Eternal alone.

(from Psalm 27 The Voice)

Author! Author!

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Photography, Sky4 Comments

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Sometimes, when alpenglow lights up the mountains for a few minutes at sunset I want to stand up and applaud, shouting “Author! Author!”

Sometimes I do.

I want to praise the Creator of all this.

I heard of a writer who tried to correct some information about his motivation for the development of a character on a Wikipedia article about himself. Ironically, the corrections he tried to make were “re-corrected” because he – the author – was not recognized as an authority on himself. (A whole other discussion about media and trust could be held here but I shall resist for the moment.)

Yesterday my son  and I were discussing theology as he helped me make dinner.  He thought there was a reason the people who marvelled at the things Jesus said recognized he that taught as one who had authority.

“It’s because he was the author,” my son said, as he mashed the potatoes. “Teachers like the scribes of Jesus’ day, can only propose theories on what they think the author meant, but Jesus spoke with authority because, as the author of the story, he knew what it meant.”

The best way to understand what the author intended is to ask the author. In Hebrews we read that Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of our faith. He is the ultimate authority on God’s intentions. Like watching a continuing saga of gigantic proportions the meaning of beginning of the story can only be fully understood in the context of the ending. This takes a brilliant author.

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,  looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrew 12 NKJV)

In Christ the great mystery of the ages is revealed.

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.  

For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him.  He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.  

And he is the head of the body, the church;

he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.  

For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. (Colossians 1: 17-20)

He speaks as one having authority.