"that you may proclaim the praises of the One who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light" 1 Peter 2:9
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Author: Carolyn
I am a Christian, a sinner saved by God's amazing grace. Much like my life, my blog is a work in progress. The main objective I have for this blog is to "proclaim the praises" of the One who called me out of darkness and into His marvelous light! (1 Peter 2:9)
I recently found this prayer in my journal, written at the start of 2024, almost a year and a half ago. With Easter week approaching, these themes encourage my heart as I reflect on who God is and all He has done for us in Christ.
Sovereign LORD, You are all powerful. In the midst of life’s storms, You enter the boat of our lives and calm our anxious hearts and fears. You bring peace and joy even when, especially when, circumstances aren’t what we would wish or hope for. We all live—all humanity—broken, earthbound lives. But You entered into our brokenness and were broken for us. You are the bread of life, the body broken. I believe You are the Victor, the One who saves, the mighty warrior who rejoices over us and tells us everything will be okay. Everything will work out in the end, not because of our worth, but Yours; not because of our works, but Your work, your finished work.
You are the great I am, the faithful, covenantal God who keeps your Word and promises. You are Jehovah Yahweh, full of grace and truth. If the Lord is on our side, who can be against us? You are a miracle worker. Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ, in whom we live and move and have our being. We are at best your unprofitable servants, who fail and sin so easily, yet you redeem, forgive, revive, rebuild, restore, renew—You are making all things new!
So I will return again in humility and repentance to seek your face. Your face will I seek in the morning and look up. In the midday and evening, in remembrance, for You do great things, and nothing is too hard for You. Praise You, Lord, and thank You. Apart from You, I can do nothing, and in me dwells no good thing. But You are the God who fills with springs of living water, gives your Spirit, and satisfies our weary souls. You comfort my heart and dry my tears and tell me You save and it will be okay. So I rest in your unfailing love that your beauty might be upon me, even as I TRUST in You.
I don’t have to fear today, because You are with me, to uphold and protect, to walk with and provide. I can leave all my concerns and worries to be safely held in your arms, the arms that spread wide on a cross to tell me of your love that would die for me, your saving right arm, extended and strong, for whom there is no rival and no one and nothing can stand against. You are so good, majestic, powerful, strong, holy, righteous, merciful, just, wise and true. Help me walk in your way with an undivided heart to fear your name, my Lord and my God. Amen.
I’ll close with this new song, “What an Awesome God,” released yesterday from Phil Wickham. I heard Rich Mullins sing the original when I was in college after its release in 1988. Then my husband and I heard Phil Wickham sing this updated version in concert in Greensboro about 3 weeks ago, where he shared he had written three new verses for a new generation. I hear the themes of Revelation and of Easter in the prayer and in the song, as we were made to worship our awesome God. I pray you have a joyous Easter week, celebrating our Risen Savior!
Looking back, since starting this blog in 2008, I’ve written posts every new year except one. Because I rarely do anything with consistency, it’s surprising to realize this is my 16th record then of new year themes!
I had no plans to write something this year or even choose a “word for the year.” My spirit wasn’t in it this year, and I was going to let it go. However, the Lord gave me a word quite clearly.
My husband and I were watching the Fiesta Bowl on New Year’s Eve. Every time the coach from Boise State was interviewed, he said something about Jesus. Even if it was a brief comment at the start of the fourth quarter when asked about the game, he went back to Jesus.
I commented to my husband, “I wonder what people think of that. Is he connecting Jesus to winning this game, because Jesus loves both teams?” But I started to see that no, he was seeing this game as a platform, a stage for him to make Jesus known and what God has done for their team. He wasn’t going to miss that opportunity. It wasn’t about winning or losing, but proclaiming, even through a sporting event.
After the game, I saw this short video on Twitter:
I realized that that this coach has had a life-changing impact on his players because he’s been unafraid to tell them about Jesus. The point wasn’t whether a national audience understood this coach pointing to Jesus. Surely many wouldn’t get it. But some would. And those were the ones he was speaking to. It made me think about my own witness. Do I care to speak the name of Jesus?
The next day, New Year’s Day, having decided I wasn’t going to do a word for the year, I put my head down on my sofa to take a brief afternoon nap. As I fell asleep, I asked the Lord if He might be willing to speak to me while I slept. I don’t know why. I haven’t prayed that kind of thing in a long while. I woke up to a verse running through my head over and over. It was from Romans 1:16:
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes…” (ESV)
Unashamed. Unashamed of the gospel. I started pondering this more.
Another verse that came to mind was 2 Timothy 2:15, one my grandfather wrote in my Bible which was a Christmas gift when I was 7 years old:
Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. (ESV)
As I began to put away our Christmas decorations, I opened a cabinet to store some items. I noticed a new Oswald Chambers’ My Utmost for His Highest devotional there from a year ago that had been unused and unopened. I pulled it out, and the January 1 entry was about being unashamed. It begins with quoting Philippians 1:20:
I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. (NIV)
Chambers writes, “We shall all feel very much ashamed if we do not yield to Jesus on the point He has asked us to yield to Him.” The devotional encourages our surrender to Christ, describing how He will often bring us to a crisis, a crossroads in our lives, to help us decide to follow Him fully.
So many thoughts started to emerge about being unashamed of the gospel, unashamed of Jesus and His Word, recognizing again as we enter a new year that He is the answer to all our fears and sorrows and brokenness, that He is sufficient for all things. I never want to settle for less than this gospel power. I want to believe Him in all things. And I want to share Him and His Word as one who is unashamed because I do know Him and His power toward all who believe.
This is how I wound up with a word for the year:unashamed. As always, there are many applications we could make, but I want to see how God uses this word in the coming year, I pray for His glory.
Do you have a word for the year or something you are resolving to do in the new year? How is it looking 9 days into January? In this new year, I pray this verse from Romans 15:13 for anyone who might read this:
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
Psalm 23 is a passage the Lord keeps bringing me to in this season of life. It’s everywhere. Its truth and beauty have taken on new depth and meaning.
After journaling to capture all the places it was showing up, I went to church, and a soloist sang a beautiful hymn “Shepherd Me, O God” (based on Psalm 23).
It was announced Chuck Swindoll is retiring. I’ll never forget his exposition on Psalm 23 at our senior retreat at Dallas Theological Seminary. What a generous man to invest in us during no doubt a busy time as president of the seminary and having a much broader ministry beyond.
Dallas Seminary Graduation Luncheon 1997 with Chuck and Cynthia Swindoll
There are numerous songs on the radio right now about Psalm 23. I was listening to Leanna Crawford’s Psalm 23, marveling at its timing. As I started an order in the Chick-fil-A curbside parking, I was singing the next song on the radio without even realizing what I was saying. But then I heard what I was singing:
“The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want; He makes me lie down in green pastures. The Lord is my Shepherd, leads me to still waters, and He restores my soul.”
This is the bridge in “Come What May,” a song not primarily about Psalm 23.
You get the idea… it’s been everywhere. It’s an encouragement to pay attention to what the Lord is speaking through His Word as we study the Bible and live our daily lives.
During this time, I woke up one morning with these words being repeated in my mind over and over: “all the days of my life, all the days of my life, all the days of my life.” Over and over. What is that? Well, it should have been obvious to me, but it took me a minute to remember it’s from Psalm 23:6, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life…” Okay, so?
Well, I went to do my daily Bible study. I’m doing Bible Study Fellowship International online this year, which has been another amazing blessing meeting women from all over the world! We are studying Revelation. In this lesson about the letter to the church at Ephesus (Rev. 2:1-7), the questions took us back to Genesis 3 to read alongside Rev. 2:7 about the Tree of Life.
As I read about the curse of the serpent and the curse of the ground (note: Adam and Eve were not cursed, though there were consequences to their sin), the LORD God told the serpent “you shall eat dust all the days of your life” (Gen. 3:14). And the LORD told Adam…, “Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life…. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return” (Gen. 3:17-19).
Contrast that to Psalm 23: “Surely goodness and lovingkindness shall follow me all the days of my life.” Look how God reverses these curses for His people. Rather than being in the dust, “He makes us lie down in green pastures”! “He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul.” What the enemy strives to take, God restores. Picture God’s goodness and lovingkindness following us, closely behind, even chasing us down as our Good Shepherd all the days of our lives!
Once you hear the themes of Psalm 23, you’ll see it everywhere.
My husband and I went to a wedding last weekend where they sang The Goodness of God: “All my life you have been faithful, all my life you have been so, so good… your goodness is running after me.” I could hear the echoes of Psalm 23 as the breeze blew through the beautiful arboretum setting. The pastor came up after the song and also pointed out it included Psalm 23.
Remember John 10:10-11, the passage where Jesus tells us He is the Good Shepherd. There’s the contrast: “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. I am the good shepherd…”
Do you see where Satan tries to destroy and kill, God instead gives life and abundance! He leads us out, He follows us behind. In fact, Galatians 3:13 tells us, “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.’)” He is the good Shepherd, but He is also the Lamb slain in our place for our sins to give us salvation! What an amazing reversal! What a grand exchange!
Not a day goes by without our Shepherd’s care and presence, His leading and following us, the sheep in need of our saving Shepherd. May His goodness and lovingkindness follow us all the days of our lives, that we may dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
This summer, my son called on a Saturday to tell me his good friend had just invited him to go to another country in five days. His friend had lived there for a year working in a school and always wanted to take his friends back there to see it. But it was only five days away until they would leave. My son had a few reservations about going, including that he was due to fly to see us at the end of it.
Well, I thought it sounded great, and I encouraged him. We started to investigate if it was possible. It was like we were on an episode of Amazing Race as we looked at the flight options and how he could make it work.
Not until he got everything booked and confirmed with his friend did I research the country. I had not realized it was a country where people are advised to re-think travel. It had been elevated since his friend had worked there. Fear overtook me about this. I had encouraged the trip, helped him look for flights, and now there was no turning back, and I had not recognized potential dangers.
I decided to call the friend’s dad who knows the country well. He would surely put my mind at ease. “Is it safe?” I asked. “Oh no, very dangerous! But so are parts of our own country,” he replied. I asked, “Did you say anything about this as the trip was being planned?” He replied, “Oh no, God is sovereign.” Well, I know God is sovereign, but shouldn’t you have said more, I’m thinking!
Rather than making me feel better, the dad had made me feel worse. My anxiety was turning to panic. So I went to my favorite place to pray, a place where God always seems to meet me, in a prayer garden. As I prayed, the Lord was encouraging me, as I gave Him my burden and began to receive His peace.
It started to rain, so I decided to leave. As I left, I thought why not drive up on the mountain and watch the sunset. As I was driving, continuing to pray, I asked the Lord about His faithfulness. “Are you faithful?”
I know and have experienced God’s faithfulness throughout my whole life, and all I needed to do was remember that. But God is so faithful that He decided to answer me clearly!
When I got up on the mountain, walking out in the rain with my umbrella, I stood there to watch the beautiful sunset. The rain subsided. As I was standing there, even observing the carefree birds singing (you can see one sitting on the bushes in the photo at the top of this post), my next door neighbor texted me: “Look out towards the road – beautiful rainbow, now a double one.”
Because I wasn’t home, I called my husband to go outside and look for me. He took this photograph:
As I was wishing I could see it, but enjoying the mountain sunset, a text came in from my son, over 700 miles away from us, sharing a rainbow he had seen on his drive home from work:
And I stood there telling the Lord that as much as I loved these two amazing texts, I also wished I could see a rainbow. I turned my head and looked up, and I saw this (a poor photo that did not capture it well!):
Three photos, three different places (two different states!), three rainbows. Three, the number of perfection.
As you may know, in Genesis 9, the rainbow is the sign of God’s covenant with Noah:
And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: 13 I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. 16 Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”
Genesis 9:12-16 (NIV)
God’s covenants in Scripture are His unbreakable promises toward us. He is the covenant Maker and the covenant Keeper. The very fact that He keeps His word, despite our failings, shows He is a faithful God.
The rainbows represented to me His faithfulness and steadfast love. It didn’t mean my son would be safe. But it meant God would be faithful to us, no matter what.
I felt like leaping and praising the Lord. (Well, I actually did.) I had come with heaviness of heart and left with joy and peace. God answered the question on my heart, the question I already knew the answer to.
As I left, there was a guy playing a tune on his guitar. (You can barely see him in the last picture above.) He told me that when he plays a hymn on the mountain, it’s usually “How Great Thou Art.”
I went home and looked up this hymn. Wikipedia reports, as to the inspiration of this hymn by Carl Boberg, according to J. Irving Erickson:
“Carl Boberg and some friends were returning home to Mönsterås from Kronobäck, where they had participated in an afternoon service. Presently a thundercloud appeared on the horizon, and soon lightning flashed across the sky. Strong winds swept over the meadows and billowing fields of grain. The thunder pealed in loud claps. Then rain came in cool fresh showers. In a little while the storm was over, and a rainbow appeared. When Boberg arrived home, he opened the window and saw the bay of Mönsterås like a mirror before him… From the woods on the other side of the bay, he heard the song of a thrush [a bird]… the church bells were tolling in the quiet evening. It was this series of sights, sounds, and experiences that inspired the writing of the song.”
Oh Lord, my God When I, in awesome wonder Consider all the worlds Thy hands have made I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder Thy power throughout the universe displayed
Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art
And when I think that God, His Son not sparing Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in That on the cross, my burden gladly bearing He bled and died to take away my sin
Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art
When Christ shall come, with shout of acclamation And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart Then I shall bow, in humble adoration And then proclaim, my God, how great Thou art
Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art How great Thou art, how great Thou art
Well, as you might imagine, my son and his two friends had an amazing trip, enjoying the travel to this beautiful country very much! And I see how much I need to release my unfounded fears and sense of control to our Sovereign God!
I encourage you today, take your questions to God. Ask in faith, and believe Him to answer. And then believe what He says. For He is indeed faithful!
“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13 (NKJV)
Most mornings, I wake up with a song in my head. It’s surprising how often the song is exactly what I need. A little bit of manna to start the day!
This morning, Katy Nichole’s Song “My God Can” was ringing in my mind. It reminded me of Philippians 4:13 at this part of the song:
I can do all things, all things, through Christ who gives me strength. I can do all things, all things, cause His Spirit lives in me.
I came down for my coffee and came across this mug (pictured at the top of this post) that I had pulled forward from the back of the cabinet a day or two ago. On April 25, 2012, I spoke at the Women’s Bible Study brunch that wraps up our yearlong Bible study at church. It was my testimony of Christ as our strength, my Rock! That same day was “Administrative Professionals Day,” which I didn’t even know existed! But my boss and his wife had a gift on my desk that morning that included this mug with Philippians 4:13 on it! As my friend would say, it was a “God wink”! Christ my strength, the focus of my talk, now highlighted on the mug, encouraging me for the talk I was about to give.
Walking with my coffee then to get my Bible and read this morning, singing the song, holding the mug, I found myself out of the blue repeating the five statement pledge of faith from Beth Moore’s Bible study Believing God that I did back in 2005. I haven’t thought about those words in a very long time, but they say, “God is who He says He is, God can do what He says He can do, I am who God says I am, I can do all things through Christ, God’s Word is alive and active in me, I’m believing God.” I wondered why I was saying that. And I realized “I can do all things through Christ” is the verse from Philippians 4:13!
I always loved that pledge of faith because it first tells me who God is and what He can do, then who I am and what I can do through Him, then gives a reminder that His Word is alive and active in me as I study it, and concludes that based on those things, I can trust and believe God. I will believe God because He is trustworthy and able to be believed. It strengthens my faith to believe Him more.
Whatever we are going through in life today, we can believe God for those situations, every single one of them: “I’m believing God.” Based on that testimony of faith, I can bring Him all my needs and trust that, as Katy Nichole sang, my God can! And I can do all things through Him who gives me strength. Rest in this truth today!
Praise Proclaimer 