Let Me Tell You One Thing

Vs3. Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself where she may lay her young-even Your altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God. Vs4. Blessed are those who dwell in Your house; they will still be praising You. Selah. Vs5. Blessed is the man whose strength is in You, whose heart is set on pilgrimage. Vs6. As they pass through the Valley of Baca.   They make it a spring; the rain also covers it with pools. Even the birds try to find the altar of God to lay their young.   The holy presence, even wildlife evidently can sense it.   Those who seek the Lord as the one thing pressing on their agenda, those will still be praising.   Still praising, after what?   I would imagine, those who seek the Lord will still be praising Him after the storm because they praised Him through the storm.   On the other hand, those who do not praise in the storm are quite battered after the storm passes over.   They are beaten...

Psalm 84 Devotions in Psalms October 8, 2015 How lovely is your tabernacle, O Lord of hosts!   (Psalm 27:4 one thing I have desired of the Lord that I will seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His temple.) Vs2. My soul longs, yes even faints for the courts of the Lord, my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God. (Psalm 42:1, 2 As the deer pants for the water brooks so pants my soul for You, O God.) One of the things that I think about is how dependent we are upon our desires to motivate us to do anything.   We cannot accomplish anything without a desire to do so.   When I read how this writer is penning how strong his desire is to be with the Lord, to behold His beauty and to want to be in the house of the Lord, and the related reference of the soul panting after the Lord, I think, now how does my desire line up with this passage? I begin by asking for a desire s...

October 6, 2015 I don't have too many moments of clarity.  I am usually chasing rabbits down a path to no where.  But ever so often, the bell will ring, the lights will come on, and the Hallelujah chorus will sing! Those are the moments when I stop, look into the face of God and say, " There really is a God!".  It is in those moments that the links connect, the dust bunnies leave, and the puzzle pieces actually fit! It can be about the smallest things, or it can be major decisions.  But Let Me Tell You One Thing, it is in those moments of clarity, that all darkness is illuminated, the questions are answered, and truth appears. How often do these times come?  Rarely. Sometimes it is a hit and miss attempt to know which direction to go with decisions in our life.  We try this way or that way, only to find it is not the way to go on a particular decision.  We often pay greatly for those times, reaping results from poor judgement and decisi...

Devotion in  Psalm 80 A Prayer for Relief September 9, 2014 Asaph. A Psalm.   1 Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, You who lead Joseph like a flock; You who dwell between the cherubim, shine forth!   2 Before Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh, Stir up Your strength, And come and save us!   3 Restore us, O God; Cause Your face to shine, And we shall be saved!   This psalm is probably related to the captivity of the ten tribes aggravated by the contrast of former prosperity, a prayer for relief comes through this Psalm.    It is a call to the Lord of hosts to lead them, a call to restore them to a former time, a call for His countenance to shine on them, to give them His favor.   In verse one, the Lord of hosts leads Israel between the cherubim like a flock             (Psalm 77:20 You led Your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.) In verse two, a referenc...

I have been thinking lately about why I incessantly use my bedside, tabletop humidifier.  I have been doing that for two years.  Even when I go out of town overnight, I drag the inconvenient thing with me.  I can't complain about it, I gave $20.00 for it at Walgreen about two years ago.  I really don't know what inspired me to buy one in the first place.  I have lived my entire existence without one so I know it is not vital for my survival.  I haven't given it much thought until recently.  I began to wonder, why am I using that stupid humidifier.  I mean every night, no matter how tired I am I go under my bathroom sink, get a 2 quart pitcher, fill it with water, fill the tank to the brim, wipe up the water I spill because I do it with one eye closed and half asleep, plug it in and usually wipe it down with a cloth to make sure there is no water on my bedside stand or on the unit itself.  But then I lie down in complete peace and usually...

Sheets have never been a particular topic that I cared to discuss with anyone.  I mean, sheets are sheets.  One sleeps on them, launders them, puts them on a mattress; they are just sheets, nothing more. I have begun to realize that even our sheets can become a complex matter if you are actually trying to shop for them.  I can remember a time when a sheet was sheet was a sheet.  You could buy them in colors, or you could buy them white.  I even remember a time when the fitted ones all came in twin, double, queen, or king sizes.  Sheets were not a major matter to contemplate.  It occurred to me as time went on, that the market place was filling up with sheets that only tried to confuse me.  I knew the size of my mattress, it was a queen sized one.  But then gradually shopping for new sheets became a thing of wonder.  I usually ended up going home and sleeping on the same old sheets even when I bought a new mattress because I was n...

Around 1999, my husband had some surgery in a doctor's office in Savannah.  After the surgery, he was to keep ice packs on the stitches to get down the swelling.  We had planned to stay in Savannah for a few days and for some reason, I saw him carrying around this silver bucket when we would leave the hotel.  I asked him, "Why do you have the silver ice bucket my mother gave us for our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary?" He said, "I knew I was supposed to have ice handy after the surgery and I couldn't find anything else to put ice in".  He dropped it soon after the surgery and broke off the silver handle and also dented the bucket up all around it. I was not too happy. For some reason I began to think about that silver bucket a few days ago, which I still have and which I still polish faithfully, and I had some thoughts connected to that bucket concerning what we do with our pain many times.  I am speaking about our emotional pains. I have found myself ...

After the busy Christmas season, and feeling pooped from standing on my feet for hours at the time, searching recipes, cooking, shopping for ingredients; I wondered what really motivates me to keep doing this.  My thoughts go back to the meals that our mother made for us down through the years.  My brother and I would bring our children to her house, our sister would be there also, but she didn't have children, and we stayed for a couple of nights, played board games, and smelled  mother's scrumptious recipes cooking. She always fixed different dishes and tried to make everyone's  favorite thing.  When all of us got around the table, a table that she had built herself that was sturdy and had benches, we would enjoy the works of her hands. There would be all kinds of cakes, pies, entrees, and breads.  She would say, "Paula, I made that special Olive Loaf you like so much."  I would just nod not realizing, in years to come, how much that would ...