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)

My Hope Is in the Lord

Carolyn

Today I feel full of praise and joy at the fact that my hope is in the Lord.

A group of ladies from work have been going through Beth Moore’s Psalms of Ascent study. The title of this week’s study was “My Hope Is in the Lord.” Psalm 130 and 131 encourage us to put our hope in the Lord and in His word. What perfect timing to reflect on that this last week.

One morning this week, after studying these psalms and focusing on the Lord being my hope, I went to the kitchen to fix lunches. I turned on the radio, and Chris Tomlin’s song, Jesus Messiah, was playing. I realized that though I had spent quiet time with the Lord, I hadn’t knelt down that morning to Him, so with that beautiful song playing, it seemed a good time to kneel before Him. As I did and started singing with the song, I realized the words I was saying, “All our HOPE is in You, LORD, All our HOPE is in You, LORD, all the glory to You, LORD…”

Then this morning, when I awoke and went to the kitchen, I flipped on the radio, and they were giving the election update. They then immediately played “Jesus Messiah”: “All our HOPE is in You, LORD, All our HOPE is in You, LORD.” Perfect timing, perfect reminder.

One other neat thing… for the last few days, a hymn has been flowing through my head. I thought the words might begin with “My Hope is in the Lord,” but it wasn’t familiar enough to know. I just now thought to look it up because it’s flowing through my head again, and yes, I found it, and here is what it tells me:

“My hope is in the Lord
Who gave Himself for me,
And paid the price of all my sin at Calvary.

Refrain: For me He died,
For me He lives,
And everlasting life and light He freely gives.

No merit of my own
His anger to suppress.
My only hope is found in Jesus’ righteousness.

And now for me He stands
Before the Father’s throne.
He shows His wounded hands
and names me as His own.

His grace has planned it all,
‘Tis mine but to believe,
And recognize His work of love and Christ receive.”

All our HOPE is in You, LORD. You are Jesus Messiah. You hold our lives and our futures. You have a purpose and plan. I trust You. And I love You. Praise You, Lord!

Sovereign God

Carolyn

I’ve been thinking a lot about the election in recent weeks.

  • I’m thankful for a Sovereign God who is seated on the throne in the heavens and whose kingdom rules over all (Psalm 103:19).
  • I’m thankful to know that He alone raises up and brings down leaders and rulers (Daniel 2:21).
  • I’m thankful that He alone can do all things, and that nothing is too hard for Him (Jeremiah 32.17).
  • I’m thankful that He alone is great and worthy of all praise (Psalm 145:3), worthy as the Lamb who was slain to receive all power, wealth, wisdom, strength, honor, glory, and praise (Rev. 5:12).
  • I’m thankful that He sets my feet on the Rock (Psalm 40:2) and keeps me secure.
  • In Him, I have complete confidence and hope, and I have no cause for fear.
  • He is my Rock, fortress, deliverer, strength, salvation, and shield (II Samuel 22; Psalm 18).
  • He will not forsake those who trust in Him (Psalm 9:10).

I’m thankful that tonight, the Lord knows the outcome of tomorrow. He knows the beginning from the end, and He is not surprised. May His good and perfect will be done.

When I got on here tonight, I was wanting to write about abortion. A few friends have stirred my soul with their comments the last weeks. I wanted to write about how I studied it in high school. How we learned how early a baby can feel. How I learned about the lies women are told. How I have heard their sorrows and feel grieved by this reality.

I wanted to write about how I had a life threatening pregnancy. How I had a daughter born, small and frail, but fully formed and beautiful at 27 weeks. How I saw those babies in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit who were born during the 2nd trimester — and they were living and breathing. How I used to wonder what someone would do if someone walked in the NICU and tried to end their lives! How it would be ok to do that if they were under the cover of their mother’s tummy still. What an unbelievable horror! What an unbelievable sorrow! Can this be real? They could feel. They could move and breathe. They are created in God’s image, knit together by Him in their mothers’ wombs, fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139). Who will speak for them? Who will cast a vote for life? Who will give them a choice?

There are certainly many other issues to consider in this election, but I hope we won’t too quickly step past this one. That we won’t allow the openness of our minds to veil our eyes and close our hearts to this atrocious practice.

For those of us who may be one-issue voters, of the likes of William Wilberforce who labored his entire adult life against slavery, I pray when this election is over, no matter the outcome, that we will find ways to support the pro-life movement with more than a single vote every 4 years. That we will contact our local crisis pregnancy center and see what we can do. That we will give money or time or prayers or thoughts to this and actively seek God for ways He would have us be involved, be they small or big.

I got on here to write about that, about abortion. But when I started writing, the truth of His Word, hidden in my heart, began to flow out, and I felt peace. Peace like a river. Peace about tomorrow. Peace because my Savior lives and rules.

Praising Him with Psalms and Songs

Carolyn

I just had an interesting follow up to a blog entry I wrote earlier. I had written about my friend praying a psalm for my husband a year or two ago, then him waking up in the night a couple of weeks after that feeling led to that psalm.

My daughter writes constantly (she is 8). I often walk over and find a poem or story or card she has put together all by herself. The other day, I found her, and she had just made a card for me and one for my husband. There was a verse on both of them. She apparently had decided to go through the Bible and randomly choose a verse for each of us. She chose a verse in Malachi for me. For my husband, she chose the first verse of that very same psalm! Out of all the verses in the Bible, that is the one she chose. I have to say, if I were my husband, I’d be giving that psalm some pretty close attention!

On another note, I started the Beth Moore Stepping Up Bible study on the Psalms of Ascent last week with some friends from work. The whole video this week was about song in Scripture and how that speaks to our heart. I’d never seen this in Scripture that much (that song accompanied creation, that God rejoices over you with singing, that Jesus will sing praises in the presence of the Father, etc.). It is its own language, and things can be expressed in song in ways that words cannot.

I find that to be so true. Praising God in song lifts our minds to higher places and even can change a bad mood to good or wrong thinking to right. I want to practice that this week and see again what God can do through praising Him and choosing to think on things above.

I will praise You in this storm!

Carolyn

Psalm 63:3 “Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You.”

It’s been raining in Chicagoland for a couple of days now, mostly heavy and nonstop. Yesterday was the greatest amount of rainfall for a single day since they started keeping records back in 1871. Cars have been submerged in some places, basements have flooded, people have had to be rescued. I realize this is nothing compared to Ike and the devastation there; this is for the most part an inconvenience, but I have never seen it rain like this. I can’t imagine what it would be like to live in a rainy part of the world with rainy seasons.

My husband and I have spent the last 2 days cleaning out the cellar of our home built in 1887. We were told in March when we moved in that it had never flooded. Not so this time, but the water was pretty minimal and able to be removed with a small pump. It did, however, cause all of our boxes to get wet, so we have now gone through all the remaining boxes from our move and either thrown it out, given it away, or stored it in plastic containers. This is a project I’d been intending to get to for 6 months, so maybe this was a blessing in disguise.

We’ve also found a small leak on the porch, and for some reason, our door to the house stopped closing. I guess when it rains, it pours! In the midst of the storm, though, I’ve found a lost journal that I had been intently praying I would find (of letters I wrote my daughter when she was in the NICU for 3 months after birth). I’ve been able to finally clean that cellar. And it happened on a weekend, so my husband and I could be home and handle this. We also found lots of toys and books the kids had been missing, and they’ve had fun playing the last couple of days while we worked. There are many things to thank and praise the Lord for in the midst of this storm.

I know it’s such a small thing, really, and such a small illustration, but when life seems a bit drab and dreary, the sun isn’t shining, there’s uncertainty around me about what’s going to happen, do I really find my refuge and confidence in the Lord? As I read Psalm 63:3 this morning (“Because Your lovingkindness if better than life, my lips shall praise You.”), I wondered, do I really believe this? Do I really think God’s lovingkindness is better than my very life? In the midst of a “storm,” can I fix my eyes on Him and have great joy because He is better than all else, even when I feel insecure and uncertain?

It’s these little imperfections of life that increase the longing for the perfect, for the eternal place where all will be right. I pray God will increase my faith so that when my feelings are inconsistent with my head and heart and I feel unsteady, I will still believe Him.

This week, we have visitors staying with us from South Korea, I start a small group women’s Bible study in our home, and I have a busy week at work. There is too much for me to lose sight of the big picture by life’s disruptions from this storm. So I choose today to praise You again, Lord. I praise You that You are here with me and that You do not forsake those who trust in You. I do praise You in this storm and praise You for Your lovingkindness toward me. I know that You are enough and all I need, so I may say with the psalmist, “Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You.”

The Spirit-Filled Life

Carolyn

As I’ve reflected on my last post, I think I’ve combined two separate ideas: how God reveals Himself and His character to us and how God speaks to His people. I think one point I was hoping to establish is that God is vast and boundless and not restrained to act just as our minds can understand. He is above the natural, and it’s incredible when you find Him invading your life in supernatural ways.

The way God has most powerfully revealed Himself to me is as my Rock and my strength, which are parallel Hebrew words. This was on April 27 and 28, 2005 (which I wrote about in an earlier post). He is also a God who can speak and act in our daily lives through His Word, prayer, and the power of His Spirit. Since April 28, 2005, He has shown me this again and again, but prior to April 28, 2005, I would have been skeptical and reluctant to believe that.

One example jumps to my mind. A couple of years ago, I was at a friend’s house and we were watching the kids play in her yard while we shared what God was doing in our lives. When we started to pray, she felt led to pray a psalm for my husband. This was not a familiar psalm to me. I thought that was sweet. A few weeks later, I was waking up one morning and my husband had been awake for a while. He said he woke up in the night and felt led to read his Bible. He had been drawn to a particular psalm and couldn’t explain why, but felt like God was showing him this. This was the same psalm my friend had prayed for him a few weeks prior to that.

Those kinds of stories are just unmistakable evidence to my heart of a God who speaks, who is intimately involved in our lives. In many ways, I think I’m writing this blog to recount His work in my life, to remember what He has done, to praise Him — but I also find I want to encourage those who might have grown up in a way similar to me. I not only had no expectation that God would speak to my heart through His Spirit, but I also rejected any notion by anyone else that He did.

But look at the promises of God in the Bible! I was missing something so wonderful, so amazing, and I never even knew! It’s called the Spirit-filled life. It’s not one that’s directed by me, dependent on me. It’s one directed by the God who has saved me and rescued me from death and the power of sin and raised me up with Him, given me new life, and given me the gift of His Spirit! The very moment I believed Him to be more than I thought or understood or could mentally manage, He absolutely revealed Himself to me that this was true!

Another thing I want to clarify is that I am talking about something here that is on the other side of salvation… after we are saved. There is only one way to God… Jesus! His shed blood on our behalf. For those who believe on Him, they are given eternal life and their sins are forgiven. He died on the cross to bear our sin and take our punishment so that we could live. And He was able to do that because He was sinless, fully God and fully man.

But I do believe that many people stop there. They believe the gospel, pray asking God to forgive them and save them, and then go on living the same way. That’s what I did. And I thought I was doing pretty good because I acted nicely, behaved well, and did what I thought was right (in my own eyes) and what I had learned by being in Christian circles. But I was missing so much!!

Christ came to transform us, to mold us into His image, to sanctify us. As we seek Him daily through the Bible and prayer, His Spirit is at work to do these things. We yield our lives to Him, and He fills us with His Spirit. And He is not confined by any limitations that we want to set upon Him.

This morning, I praise God because He loved me and saved me. And I praise Him for opening my eyes to see and know more of Him.