But Christ is all, and in all.
--Colossians 3:11
But as for me, I am like a green olive tree in the house of God; my trust is in the tender mercy of God forever and ever. [Psalm 52:9]
But his answer was: "My grace is all you need, for my power is greatest when you are weak."
2 Corinthians 12:9 (GNT)
MY grace is all you need...
My GRACE is all you need...
My grace IS all you need...
My grace is ALL you need...
My grace is all YOU need...
My grace is all you NEED...
--- I Chronicles 25:6 (KJV)
A world-class musician sits within the rubble of an iconic bombed-out cathedral, playing poignant music.
With his heart and sacred surroundings ravaged by the wounds of senseless war, cellist Sevak Avanesyn resiliently tuned his thoughts and talents to produce beauty. What he played -- a piece composed in the early 20th Century by a priest who once identified with this holy, now-suffering space. .
O God, our Help in ages past, when ruin surrounds us and the beauty of former times ceases to exist, grant us Your strength
to produce worshipful sounds amidst devastation.
*Artwork as seen on armenpress.am
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord.
-- Isaiah 55:8
We were sailing on the bay when I noticed something strange afar off on the horizon. From a distance, it looked like a big black blob sitting atop the water, with smokestacks protruding out from various places. My husband grabbed the binoculars and gasped at what he saw.
Atop a barge sat half of a submarine! As it headed up the channel and loomed closer, we gazed upon it in fascination. Clearly some sort of big project was in the works.
Later, I thought about that submarine – ugly and unrecognizable from afar, cut completely in half, yet an amazing project was in process.
Life can be that way.
We can’t make out what is happening, and we feel cut to the
quick. Yet as time passes, and we seek
the Master planner, things can become more clear. We may realize that God has us in the middle
of an amazing project. Although we don’t
fully know what is going on and we are cut in half, we seek God and trust that He is doing something big and beyond the scope of our imagination.
Lord, help me to believe that you are doing something good when all I can see is a black blob. Please keep me in Your channel -- on my own, I will run aground.
Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.
Read below a 1980 translation of the same section, by
Allen Mandelbaum:
Both are translated from the same original text and express a common condition of middle-aged life. For me, the first provides exceptionally beautiful language and evokes deep inner stirrings.
In a similar way, experience Psalm 107:4, first from
a 1610 English translation and then a 1970s version.
They wandered in a
wilderness, in a place without water: they found not the way of a city for
their habitation.
(Douay Rheims Version 1610)
Lord, when I find myself lost in the forest of life, allow me to hear Your words in such a way that my heart is stirred.