Prayer Requests & Praise Reports: May 19th, 2013

You Lord wait. We wait. We anticipate Your drawing us out of this world. Help us enrich our time left here with the aroma of Your presence with us. As we pass people, may they see the eternal difference in our countenance. May they hear praise for You even in our silence. May they see unconditional love in our actions in the face of cruelty and mocking indifference. May they see we walk toward the best that is yet to come. May they see we bear the mark of a crucified loving Saviour Who does not abandon. May they see Jesus coming.

Father, draw us into peace that passes understanding as we see the world, country deteriorate. We cling to the Rock that is higher than I.
We assemble in green pastures. Your eyes are upon us. You sing over us with love. You define all things possible. We rest in Your care. We believe Your ability.
Hold us together in the circumstances to see Your glory and power to save now. We accept the difficult to learn obedience and trust. You are Sovereign. Make us beautiful servants.    ~ Clean Hands Pure Heart~

Update

Allan-  Jan’s surgery was again delayed due to an infection. She is now awaiting the date it will take place.

Allan-  A friend lost her husband a year ago. This not too long after she had a leg amputated. She has now moved out of state to be close to her daughters. She has lost 37 pounds and is battling deep depression. Her name is Jan.  Jan will be having a second bypass on her good leg due to circulation issues. In preparing for her surgery they found she has had a silent heart attack. Her surgery is in about a week.

Prayer Requests

lensgirl53- Please pray for Mariah, my granddaughter, who at the age of 11 yrs. has separation anxiety from her mother every single time they are apart. She is at a youth retreat…her very first time being away from our family and already they have called saying that she is very upset and wants her mother. Her mother (our daughter) has taken her to see a counselor for this….we believe it has a lot to do with what our family has suffered because of the passing of our son. Please pray for peace in Mariah’s heart and mind and that this youth retreat will be an uplifting spiritual experience instead of being remembered as a time of separation and anxiety. Thank you.

Allan-  Please pray for Owen who recently had open heart surgery.  He was taken back to the ER  as his heart was out of rhythm and it has been fixed.

lensgirl53-  Please pray for my daughter Vanessa who suffers from Misophonia (hearing sensitivity which causes rage and depression) and Borderline Personality Disorder. She has lost so much because of this…jobs, relationships….etc….we are at an all time low over this on top of losing our son to suicide. Thank you so much. God bless you.

Allan-  My cousin DeAnna is recovering from a double mastectomy. Please pray there will be no complications as she goes through treatments  and the cancer will be gone.

Allan-  I just received word that an old friend who helped me so much in my early years as a believer tried to commit suicide. Finances and health issues have been and are overwhelming. Please pray that Dick would regain hope and that God would move mightily in his life.

Unanswered?: Streams In The Desert, May 18th, 2013

“Hear what the unjust judge saith. And shall not God avenge his own elect which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them? I tell you that he will avenge them speedily” Luke 18:6, 7

God’s seasons are not at your beck. If the first stroke of the flint doth not bring forth the fire, you must strike again. God will hear prayer, but He may not answer it at the time which we in our minds have appointed; He will reveal Himself to our seeking hearts, but not just when and where we have settled in our own expectations. Hence the need of perseverance and importunity in supplication.

In the days of flint and steel and brimstone matches we had to strike and strike again, dozens of times, before we could get a spark to live in the tinder; and we were thankful enough if we succeeded at last.

Shall we not be as persevering and hopeful as to heavenly things? We have more certainty of success in this business than we had with our flint and steel, for we have God’s promises at our back.

Never let us despair. God’s time for mercy will come; yea, it has come, if our time for believing has arrived. Ask in faith nothing wavering; but never cease from petitioning because the King delays to reply. Strike the steel again. Make the sparks fly and have your tinder ready; you will get a light before long. –C. H. Spurgeon

I do not believe that there is such a thing in the history of God’s kingdom as a right prayer offered in a right spirit that is forever left unanswered. –Theodore L. Cuyler

Faith Triumphs: Streams In The Desert, May 11th, 2013

God promises Abraham as many children as the stars of the sky.

 

“Under hopeless circumstances he hopefully believed” Romans 4:18 (Weymouth)

Abraham’s faith seemed to be in a thorough correspondence with the power and constant faithfulness of Jehovah. In the outward circumstances in which he was placed, he had not the greatest cause to expect the fulfillment of the promise. Yet he believed the Word of the Lord, and looked forward to the time when his seed should be as the stars of heaven for multitude.

O my soul, thou hast not one single promise only, like Abraham, but a thousand promises, and many patterns of faithful believers before thee: it behooves thee, therefore, to rely with confidence upon the Word of God. And though He delayeth His help, and the evil seemeth to grow worse and worse, be not weak, but rather strong, and rejoice, since the most glorious promises of God are generally fulfilled in such a wondrous manner that He steps forth to save us at a time when there is the least appearance of it.

He commonly brings His help in our greatest extremity, that His finger may plainly appear in our deliverance. And this method He chooses that we may not trust upon anything that we see or feel, as we are always apt to do, but only upon His bare Word, which we may depend upon in every state.
–C. H. Von Bogatzky

***

Remember it is the very time for faith to work when sight ceases. The greater the difficulties, the easier for faith; as long as there remain certain natural prospects, faith does not get on even as easily as where natural prospects fail.
–George Mueller

It Must Be Bought: Streams In The Desert, May 4th, 2013

“On all bare heights shall be their pasture” Isaiah 49:9, RV

Toys and trinkets are easily won, but the greatest things are greatly bought. The top-most place of power is always bought with blood. You may have the pinnacles if you have enough blood to pay. That is the conquest condition of the holy heights everywhere. The story of real heroisms is the story of sacrificial blood. The chiefest values in life and character are not blown across our way by vagrant winds. Great souls have great sorrows.

***

“Great truths are dearly bought, the common truths,
Such as men give and take front day to day,
Come in the common walk of easy life,
Blown by the careless wind across our way.

“Great truths are greatly won, not found by chance,
Nor wafted on the breath of summer dream;
But grasped in the great struggle of the soul,
Hard buffeting with adverse wind and stream.

“But in the day of conflict, fear and grief,
When the strong hand of God, put forth in might,
Plows up the subsoil of the stagnant heart,
And brings the imprisoned truth seed to the light.

“Wrung from the troubled spirit, in hard hours
Of weakness, solitude, perchance of pain,
Truth springs like harvest from the well-plowed field,
And the soul feels it has not wept in vain.”

***

The capacity for knowing God enlarges as we are brought by Him into circumstances which oblige us to exercise faith; so, when difficulties beset our path let us thank God that He is taking trouble with us, and lean hard upon Him.

His Billows: Streams In The Desert, April 27th, 2013

 

“All thy waves and thy billows are gone over me”  Psalms 42:7

They are HIS billows, whether they go o’er us,
Hiding His face in smothering spray and foam;
Or smooth and sparkling, spread a path before us,
And to our haven bear us safely home.

They are HIS billows, whether for our succor
He walks across them, stilling all our fear;
Or to our cry there comes no aid nor answer,
And in the lonely silence none is near.

They are HIS billows, whether we are toiling
Through tempest-driven waves that never cease,
While deep to deep with clamor loud is calling;
Or at His word they hush themselves in peace.

They are HIS billows, whether He divides them,
Making us walk dryshod where seas had flowed;
Or lets tumultuous breakers surge about us,
Rushing unchecked across our only road.

They are HIS billows, and He brings us through them;
So He has promised, so His love will do.
Keeping and leading, guiding and upholding,
To His sure harbor, He will bring us through.
–Annie Johnson Flint

***

Stand up in the place where the dear Lord has put you, and there do your best. God gives us trial tests. He puts life before us as an antagonist face to face. Out of the buffeting of a serious conflict we are expected to grow strong. The tree that grows where tempests toss its boughs and bend its trunk often almost to breaking, is often more firmly rooted than the tree which grows in the sequestered valley where no storm ever brings stress or strain. The same is true of life. The grandest character is grown in hardship.
–Selected

Impressions: Streams In The Desert, April 20th, 2013

 

“The ark of the covenant of the Lord went before them” Numbers 10:33

God does give us impressions, but not that we should act on them as impressions. If the impression be from God, He will Himself give sufficient evidence to establish it beyond the possibility of a doubt.

How beautiful is the story of Jeremiah, of the impression that came to him respecting the purchase of the field of Anathoth. But Jeremiah did not act upon this impression until after the following day, when his uncle’s son came to him and brought him external evidence by making a proposal for the purchase. Then Jeremiah said: “I knew this was the word of the Lord.”

He waited until God seconded the impression by a providence, and then he acted in full view of the open facts, which could bring conviction unto others as well as to himself. God wants us to act according to His mind. We are not to ignore the Shepherd’s personal voice but, like Paul and his companions at Troas, we are to listen to all the voices that speak and “gather” from all the circumstances, as they did, the full mind of the Lord.
–Dr. Simpson

***

“Where God’s finger points, there God’s hand will make the way.”

***

Do not say in thine heart what thou wilt or wilt not do, but wait upon God until He makes known His way. So long as that way is hidden it is clear that there is no need of action, and that He accounts Himself responsible for all the results of keeping thee where thou art.
–Selected

***

“For God through ways we have not known,
Will lead His own.”

Joy In Prison: Streams In The Desert, April 13th, 2013

Joseph sold by his brothers.

“And Joseph’s master took him, and put him into a prison . . . But Jehovah was with Joseph . . . and that which he did, Jehovah made it to prosper” Genesis 39:20-23

When God lets us go to prison because we have been serving Him, and goes there with us, prison is about the most blessed place in the world that we could be in. Joseph seems to have known that. He did not sulk and grow discouraged and rebellious because .”everything was against him.” If he had, the prison-keeper would never have trusted him so. Joseph does not even seem to have pitied himself.

Let us remember that if self-pity is allowed to set in, that is the end of us–until it is cast utterly from us. Joseph just turned over everything in joyous trust to God, and so the keeper of the prison turned over everything to Joseph. Lord Jesus, when the prison doors close in on me, keep me trusting, and keep my joy full and abounding. Prosper Thy work through me in prison: even there, make me free indeed.
–Selected

***

A little bird I am,
Shut from the fields of air,
And in my cage I sit and sing
To Him who placed me there;

Well pleased a prisoner to be,
Because, my God, it pleaseth Thee.

My cage confines me round,
Abroad I cannot fly,
But though my wing is closely bound,
My soul is at liberty;

For prison walls cannot control
The flight, the freedom of the soul.

I have learnt to love the darkness of sorrow; there you see the brightness of His face.
–Madame Guyon

The Body Fashioned Anew: Morning & Evening, Charles Spurgeon

Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body. (Philippians 3:21)

Often when we are racked with pain and unable to think or worship, we feel that this indeed is “the body of our humiliation,” and when we are tempted by the passions which rise from the flesh we do not think the word vile at all too vigorous a translation. Our bodies humble us; and that is about the best thing they do for us. Oh, that we were duly lowly, because our bodies ally us with animals and even link us with the dust!

But our Savior, the Lord Jesus, shall change all this. We shall be fashioned like His own body of glory. This will take place in all who believe in Jesus. By faith their souls have been transformed, and their bodies will undergo such a renewal as shall fit them for their regenerated spirits. How soon this grand transformation will happen we cannot tell; but the thought of it should help us to bear the trials of today and all the woes of the flesh. In a little while we shall be as Jesus now is. No more aching brows, no more swollen limbs, no more dim eyes, no more fainting hearts. The old man shall be no more a bundle of infirmities, nor the sick man a mass of agony. “Like unto his glorious body.” What an expression! Even our flesh shall rest in hope of such a resurrection!

---

Through The Fire: Streams In The Desert, April 6th, 2013

Job and his ‘counselors’.

“So the Lord blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning” Job 42:12

Through his griefs Job came to his heritage. He was tried that his godliness might be confirmed. Are not my troubles intended to deepen my character and to robe me in graces I had little of before? I come to my glory through eclipses, tears, death. My ripest fruit grows against the roughest wall. Job’s afflictions left him with higher conceptions of God and lowlier thoughts of himself. “Now,” he cried, “mine eye seeth thee.

And if, through pain and loss, I feel God so near in His majesty that I bend low before Him and pray, “Thy will be done,” I gain very much. God gave Job glimpses of the future glory. In those wearisome days and nights, he penetrated within the veil, and could say, “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” Surely the latter end of Job was more blessed than the beginning.
–In the Hour of Silence

***

“Trouble never comes to a man unless she brings a nugget of gold in her hand.”

***

Apparent adversity will finally turn out to be the advantage of the right if we are only willing to keep on working and to wait patiently. How steadfastly the great victor souls have kept at their work, dauntless and unafraid! There are blessings which we cannot obtain if we cannot accept and endure suffering. There are joys that can come to us only through sorrow. There are revealings of Divine truth which we can get only when earth’s lights have gone out. There are harvests which can grow only after the plowshare has done its work.
–Selected

***

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seamed with scars; martyrs have put on their coronation robes glittering with fire, and through their tears have the sorrowful first seen the gates of Heaven.
–Chapin

***

I shall know by the gleam and glitter
Of the golden chain you wear,
By your heart’s calm strength in loving,
Of the fire you have had to bear.
Beat on, true heart, forever;
Shine bright, strong golden chain;
And bless the cleansing fire
And the furnace of living pain!
–Adelaide Proctor

Facts vs. Feelings: Streams In The Desert, March 30th, 2013

Peter walking on water.

“We walk by faith, not by appearance” 2 Corinthians 5:7 RV

By faith, not appearance; God never wants us to look at our feelings. Self may want us to; and Satan may want us to. But God wants us to face facts, not feelings; the facts of Christ and of His finished and perfect work for us.

When we face these precious facts, and believe them because God says they are facts, God will take care of our feelings.

God never gives feeling to enable us to trust Him;
God never gives feeling to encourage us to trust Him;
God never gives feeling to show that we have already and utterly trusted Him.

God gives feeling only when He sees that we trust Him apart from all feeling, resting on His own Word, and on His own faithfulness to His promise.

Never until then can the feeling (which is from God) possibly come; and God will give the feeling in such a measure and at such a time as His love sees best for the individual case.

We must choose between facing toward our feelings and facing toward God’s facts. Our feelings may be as uncertain as the sea or the shifting sands. God’s facts are as certain as the Rock of Ages, even Christ Himself, who is the same yesterday, today and forever.

***

“When darkness veils His lovely face
I rest on His unchanging grace;
In every high and stormy gale,
My anchor holds within the veil.”