I Am Resolved

I am only making one New Year's resolution this year.  Hey...it may not be much, but it's one more than I made last year!  

Reading through Calvin's The Institutes of Christian Religion in a year wasn't my idea...it came from this blog post by Tim Keller.  

It's a tall order and will require sustained and intentional effort, but that's the sort of discipline I need in my life these days.  So...here goes!

Safe Walking

"All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep His covenant and His testimonies."  Psalm 25:10

The paths of the Lord? My soul! never follow thine own paths. Let this be thy prayer, "Show me Thy ways, O Lord; teach me Thy paths."  Oh! for Caleb's spirit to "wholly follow the Lord my God," - to follow Him when self must be sacrificed, and hardship must be borne, and trials await me.  To "walk with God," - to ask in faith, "What wouldst Thou have me to do?" - to have no will of my own, save this, that God's will is to be my will.  Here is safety - here is happiness.  Fearlessly following the Guiding Pillar.  He will lead you by a right way, though it may be a way of hardship, and crosses, and losses, and privations, to the city of habitation.  Oh! the blessedness of thus lying passive in the hands of God saying, "Undertake Thou for me!" - dwelling with holy gratitude on past mercies and interpositions - taking these as pledges of future faithfulness and love.

John Ross Macduff  - The Faithful Promiser

Albert's All-Stars

One of the great events hosted by the Pujols Family Foundation here in St. Louis, is the All-Star Basketball game in which celebrities come to Missouri Baptist and play alongside some of the foundation's clientele.  For this year's O Night Divine fundraiser, Coolfire Media created another humorous and touching video that highlights the Kime family's experience with this event.  (I recommend watching it in full screen mode.)  Prepare to smile...

Pujols Family Foundation - All Star Basketball Game 2012 from Coolfire Originals on Vimeo.

Music Monday: Lyle

If you don't have 18 minutes, skip ahead to about 7:15 and listen to "If You Were to Wake Up."   Beyond words...

Providential Overruling

My soul! be still! thou art in the hands of thy Covenant God.  Were these strange vicissitudes in thy history the result of accident, or chance, thou mightest well be overwhelmed; but "all things," and this thing (be what it may) which may be now disquieting thee, is one of these "all things" that are so working mysteriously for thy good.  Trust thy God!  He will not deceive thee, - thy interests are with Him in safe custody.  When sight says, "All these things are against me," let faith rebuke thy hasty conclusion and say, "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?"  How often does God hedge up our way with thorns to elicit simple trust!  How seldom can we see all things so working for our good!  But it is better discipline to believe it.  Oh! for faith amid frowning providences to say, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him!"  Blessed Jesus! to thee are committed the reins of this universal empire.  The same hand that was once nailed to the cross, is now wielding the sceptre on the throne, - "all power given unto thee in heaven and in earth."  How can I doubt the wisdom, and faithfulness, and love, of the most mysterious earthly dealing, whenI know the Roll of Providence is thus in the hands of Him who has given the mightiest pledge Omnipotence could give of His tender interest in my soul's well-being by giving Himself for me?

---The Faithful Promiser, John Ross Macduff

Riesa Kay

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Pardoning Grace

"Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow."  (Isaiah)

My soul! thy God summons thee to His audience chamber!  Infinite purity seeks to reason with infinite vileness!  Deity stoops to speak to dust!  Dread not the meeting.  It is the most gracious, as well as wondrous of all conferences.  Yahweh himself breaks silence!  He utters the best tidings a lost soul can hear: "God in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing unto men their trespasses."  What?!  Scarlet sins, and crimson sins! and these all to be forgiven and forgotten?!  The just God "justifying" the unjust - the mightiest of all beings, the kindest of all!  Thou mightest have known thy God only as the "consuming fire," and had nothing before thee save a "fearful looking for of vengeance!"  This gracious conference bids thee dispel thy fears!  It tells thee it is no longer a fearful but a blessed thing to fall into His hands.   Hast thou closed with these His overtures?  Until thou art at peace with Him, happiness must be a stranger to thy bosom.  Though thou hast all else beside, bereft of God thou must be "bereft indeed!"  Lord, I come!  As thy pardoning grace is freely tendered, so shall I freely accept it.  May it be mine, even now to listen to the gladdening accents, "Daughter! be of good cheer! thy sins, which are many, are all forgiven thee."

--The Faithful Promiser, John Ross Macduff

Music Monday: The Lumineers

Musical Monday: Handel

Christmas Poem

From a Christmas card sent years ago by Bill & Lois Linton:

This day,
In sadness borne,
We must confess:
The Spirit of the Age
Has crushed
The infant in the cradle.
And yet:
O glorious yet!
One day, in gladness shown,
We must profess:
The infant from the manger
Has crushed
The Spirit of the Age.

-Tristan Gylberd