Author: pastorevanaolcom

Thursday, June 27^th

Day 61

Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shem,

and called the name of it Ebenezer,

saying,

Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.  

I Samuel 7:12

Come, Thou fount of every blessing,

Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;

Streams of mercy, never ceasing,

Call for songs of loudest praise.

Teach me some melodious sonnet,

Sung by flaming tongues above;

Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,

Mount of Thy redeeming love.

Here, I raise mine Ebenezer;

Hither by Thy help I’m come;

And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,

Safely to arrive at home.

Jesus sought me when a stranger,

Wandering from the fold of God;

He, to rescue me from danger,

Interposed His precious blood.

O to grace how great a debtor

Daily I’m constrained to be!

Let Thy goodness like a fetter,

Bind my wandering heart to Thee:

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,

Prone to leave the God I love;

Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,

Seal it for Thy courts above.

Lord, You planted these hymns of the faith deep in my soul years ago and they have born fruit.

They are bearing fruit this day.

You bring to my mind just what I need to hear – just when I need to hear it – and I praise You!

 No distant Lord have I,

Loving afar to be;

Made flesh for me, He cannot rest

Until He rests in me.

Brother in joy or pain,

Bone of my bone was He;

Now – intimacy closer still –

He dwells Himself in me.

I need not journey far,

This dearest Friend to see;

Companionship is always mine,

He makes His home with me.

-Maltbie D. Babcock

-Springs in The Valley

Wednesday, June 26^th

Day 60

Have you come to the Red Sea place in your life,

Where in spite of all you can do,

There is no way out, there is no way back,

There is no other way but through?

Then wait on the Lord with a trust serene

Till the night of your fear is gone;

He will send the wind, He will heap the floods,

When He says to your soul, “Go on.”

And His hand will lead you through – clear through –

Ere the watery walls roll down,

No foe can reach you, no wave can touch,

No mightiest sea can drown;

The tossing billows may rear their crests,

Their foam at your feet may break,

But over their bed you shall walk dry shod

In the path that your Lord will make.

In the morning watch, ‘neath the lifted cloud,

You shall see but the Lord alone,

When He leads you on from the place of the sea

To a land that you have not known;

And your fears shall pass as your foes have passed,

You shall be no more afraid;

You shall sing His praise in a better place,

A place that His hand has made.

-Annie Johnson Flint

-Streams In The Desert

Lord, this is where I am – 60 days on this journey –

There is no way out, there is no way back,

There is no other way but through!

All that I can do is go where You lead me.

And so I trust.

Tuesday, June 25^th

Day 59

But I want you to know, brethren,

that the things which have happened to me

have actually turned out for the furtherance of the gospel.

Philippians 1:12

While the yoke of the Lord is easy and His burden light,

nevertheless the furrow that He calls us to undertake is not always by any means easy plowing.

There is no yoke that fits so smoothly and handily as His,

but there is no work that requires more steady trudging and persistent faithfulness than His.

Three stages of that work are strikingly set forth by Hudson Taylor when he says:

“Commonly there are three stages in work for God:

Imposible, Difficult, Done!

-Springs In The Valley

We say that there ought to be no sorrow,

but there is sorrow,

and we have to receive ourselves in its fires.

If we try and evade sorrow, refuse to lay our account with it, we are foolish.

Sorrow is one of the biggest facts in life; it is no use saying sorrow ought not to be.

Sin and sorrow and suffering are,

and it is not for us to say that God has made a mistake in allowing them.

Sorrow burns up a great amount of shallowness, but it does not always make a man better.

Suffering either will give me myself or it destroys myself,

You cannot receive your self in success, you lose your head;

you cannot receive yourself in monotony, you grouse.

The way to find yourself is in the fires of sorrow.

Why it should be so is another matter,

but that it is so

is true in the Scriptures and in human experience.

. . . . . . . . . .

If you receive yourself in the fires of sorrow,

God will make you nourishment for other people.

-Oswald Chambers

Lord, This is my life. It wasn’t my choice but I can accept it because You are with me in this.

Monday, June 24^th

Day 58

We are still in a hot, dry spell.

85 degrees at 5 a.m.

The thunder storms have all passed us by.

This is an inconvenience for me – I will have to water the garden – but for our farmers who have no irrigation systems it is a disaster – crops will die if they get no rain.

I pray for rain to fall on those fields.

I pray for the farm families depending on those crops for their income for the year.

Most of all I pray that they know You, Lord, and are trusting in You to provide a way – even if the rains do not come – even if the crops fail – You will provide for Your people.

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines,

though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food,

though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls,

yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior.

Habakkuk 3: 17-18

Sunday, June 23^rd

Day 57

My song for today:

Does Jesus care when my heart is pained

Too deeply for mirth and song?

Where the burdens press and the cares distress

And the way grows weary and long?

Oh, yes, He cares, I know He cares

His heart is touched with my grief

When the days are weary – the long night dreary

I know my Jesus cares.

Does Jesus care when my way is dark

With a nameless dread and fear?

As the daylight fades into deep dark shades

Does He care enough to be near?

Oh, yes, He cares, I know He cares

His heart is touched with my grief

When the days are weary – the long night dreary

I know my Jesus cares.

Does Jesus care when I’ve tried and failed

To resist some temptation strong?

When for my deep grief there is no relief

Though the tears flow all the day long.

Oh, yes, He cares, I know He cares

His heart is touched with my grief

When the days are weary – the long night dreary

I know my Jesus cares.

Does Jesus care when I’ve said”Goodbye”

To the dearest on earth to me

And my sad heart aches till it nearly breaks

Is it aught to Him? Does He see?

Oh, yes, He cares, I know He cares

His heart is touched with my grief

When the days are weary – the long night dreary

I know my Jesus cares.

Saturday, June 22^nd

Day 56

Not I, but Christ.

Galatians:2:20

Full of the Holy Spirit.

Acts 11:24

We would in Thee abide,

In Thee be glorified,

And shine as candles

“lighted by the Lord.”

It is not I that burns,

But the oil with which my texture is saturated.

This is my twofold need: oil and trimming.

Give me these and I shall burn to the end!

You may seem altogether helpless and inadequate, but a living fountain of oil is prepared to furnish you with inexhaustible supplies:

Not by your might or power, but by His Spirit.

Hour after hour the oil climbs up the wick to the flame!

You cannot exhaust God!

-Springs In The Valley

Give me oil in my lamp, keep me burning.

Give me oil in my lamp, I pray;

Give me oil in my lamp, keep me burning,

Keep me burning till the break of day.

Sing Hosanna, Sing Hosanna,

Sing Hosanna to the King of Kings!

Sing Hosanna, Sing Hosanna,

Sing Hosanna to the King!

Give me joy in my heart, Keep me praising . . .

Give a song to my heart, Keep me singing . . .

Give me peace in my heart, Keep me loving . . .

Give me love in my heart, Keep me serving . . .

Thursday, June 20^th

Day 54

I laid me down and slept;

I awaked;

For the Lord sustained me.

Psalm 3:5

 A restless night.

Lord, how can I ne so tired and yet not be able to sleep?

And now, when it is time to get up and get moving, all I want to do is lie down and close my eyes.

Lord, help me through this day and then bless me with a good night’s rest and restorative sleep.

I thank you for caring for me.

Friday, June 21^st

Day 55

I laid me down and slept;

I awaked;

For the Lord sustained me.

Psalm 3:5

Lord, You answered my prayer in an amazing way.

My neighbors from the Kenton Mennonite Church filled my home with music last night.

All those voices blended in songs of praise.

What a blessing!

And I slept the whole night through.

I begin this day well rested and I am filled with Your peace.

Oh how You care for me.

Thank You for these neighbors.

Thank You for sending them to remind me that You are always working, always providing, always caring.

Praise God!

The God of the infinite is the God of the infinitesimal.

-Springs In The Valley

Lord God Almighty,

I am reminded that You care about every detail of my life.

Nothing is beneath Your notice.

I have witnessed this many times over throughout these past 73 years, and especially in these past weeks.

You are with me – ALWAYS!

Counting my blessings.

To all of you who have impacted my life:

There is not enough space to put pictures of all that God has blessed me with.

Just know that He has used you to be a blessing to me

Tuesday, June 18^th

Day 52

The preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the Lord.

All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the Lord weigheth the spirits.

Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established.

There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.

Proverbs 16:1-3, 25 KJV

Mortals make elaborate plans, but God has the last word.

Humans are satisfied with whatever looks good; God probes for what is good.

Put God in charge of your work. Then what you’ve planned will take place.

There’s a way that looks harmless enough; look again – it leads straight to hell.

Proverbs 16:1-3, 25 The Message

Lord, this is why I need You to guide me.

You know what is best. I do not.

What makes sense to the world isn’t always the best way in Your sight.

I know that Your way is the best way for me.

Let actual circumstances be what they may,

 keep recognizing Jesus,

maintain complete reliance on Him.

-Oswald Chambers

Don’t let your feet “be turned out of the way,”

but let your body “be healed,”

your faith strengthened.

Go right ahead and leave no Jericho behind you unconquered

and no place where Satan can say that he was too much for you.

This is a profitable lesson and an intensely practical one.

-A. B. Simpson

Lord, these are difficult circumstances but I will stand on the ROCK.

Satan has done his worst but I remain standing firm in my faith.

My God Is Greater!

Monday, June 17^th

Day 51

The Scriptures are a record of Your faithfulness.

Lord, this is how I know that I can trust You.

What You have done in the past stands as a reminder of what You will do in the future.

You created this world, this universe, you created us, and Your actions recorded in Your Word give me a solid foundation so that I can stand when all around me is chaos.

Thank You God!