lovely day

Thank you Lord for friendship :) :) :)

. . . and walking home in a warm spring rain :)

How Firm a Foundation

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,

Is laid for your faith in His excellent Word!

What more can He say than to you He hath said,

You, who unto Jesus for refuge have fled?

In every condition, in sickness, in health;

In poverty’s vale, or abounding in wealth;

At home and abroad, on the land, on the sea,

As thy days may demand, shall thy strength ever be.

Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,

For I am thy God and will still give thee aid;

I’ll strengthen and help thee, and cause thee to stand

Upheld by My righteous, omnipotent hand.

When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;

For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,

And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

When through fiery trials thy pathways shall lie,
My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply;

The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design

Thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine.

Even down to old age all My people shall prove
My sovereign, eternal, unchangeable love;

And when hoary hairs shall their temples adorn,

Like lambs they shall still in My bosom be borne.

The soul that on Jesus has leaned for repose,
I will not, I will not desert to its foes;

That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,

I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.

don't have to look beautiful

"Someone once said that dancers work just as hard as policemen, always alert, always tense. But I don't agree with that because policemen don't have to look beautiful at the same time." ~George Balanchine

What if it's not that we have to look beautiful?

What if it's that were allowed to be beautiful? 

What if it's that, no matter what's happening, there will be beauty in ballet --for the audience and the dancers? 

But, the dancers are allowed to take part in portraying that beauty.

What if, in a very subtle way, that's a reflection of our desire for a eternally stable beauty? What if it reveals our need and love for the gospel? 

Thy Will Be Done

"My God, my Father, while I stray

Far from my home on life's rough way

Oh, teach me from my heart to say,

'Thy will be done.'

Though dark my path and sad my lot,

Let me be still and murmur not

Or breathe the prayer divinely taught,

'Thy will be done.'

What though in lonely grief I sigh

For friends beloved, no longer nigh,

Submissive still would I reply--

'Thy will be done.'

Though Thou hast called me to resign

What most I prized, it ne'er was mine;

I have but yielded what was Thine--

'Thy will be done.'

Should grief or sickness waste away

My life in premature decay,

My Father, still I strive to say,

'Thy will be done.'

 Let but my fainting heart be blest

With Thy sweet Spirit for its Guest;

My God, to Thee I leave the rest--

'Thy will be done.'

 Renew my will from day to day;

Blend it with Thine and take away

All that now makes it hard to say,

'Thy will be done.'

Then, when on earth I breathe no more,

The prayer, oft mixed with tears before,

I'll sing upon a happier shore,

'Thy will be done.'"

green eggs (and ham) and pink ink drink

My daddy sent me this text: 

                                                                                                        

"Wish you were here beautiful." 

Yes, I'm definitely missing home. 

"In one sense faith is the opposite of straining. It is ceasing from the effort to earn God's approval or demonstrate your worth or merit. It is resting in the gracious promises of God to pursue us with goodness and mercy all our days. Faith is intrinsically easy. But this ease of faith assumes that our hearts are humble enough to renounce all self-reliance and self-direction and self-exaltation. It assumes a heart that is spiritual enough to taste and delight in the beauty and worth of God. It assumes that the world and the devil have lost their power to lure us away from satisfaction in God. If these assumptions are not true, then living by faith in future grace will not be easy as we might have thought, but will involve a lifetime of struggle." ~John Piper

200 calories

helpful pictures . . . and more reason to love vegetables :)