Keeping It Together

How can we not lose our souls when everything and everybody pulls us in the most different directions? How can we "keep it together" when we are constantly torn apart?

Jesus says: "Not a hair of your head will be lost. Your perseverance will win you your lives" (Luke 21:18-19).

We can only survive our world when we trust that God knows us more intimately than we know ourselves. We can only keep it together when we believe that God holds us together. We can only win our lives when we remain faithful to the truth that every little part of us, yes, every hair, is completely safe in the divine embrace of our Lord.

To say it differently: When we keep living a spiritual life, we have nothing to be afraid of.

- Henri Nouwen

Jesus is our Way of "keeping it together".

Grateful

When I Am Overwhelmed...

When I am overwhelmed,
You alone know the way I should turn.
-- Psalm 142:3a (NLT)

My personal edit of a powerful prayer adapted from John and Charles Wesley's Covenant Service:

Lord Jesus, here we are, lost creatures apart from You, and enemies to God, under His wrath and curse. Lord, undertake for us, reconcile us to God, and save our souls. You have promised not to refuse us, for we have nowhere else to go. If we had come in our own righteousness, you would with good reason have sent us away; but since we come at the command of the Father, and because of Your great love, we know You will not reject us. We come, Lord. We believe, Lord. We throw ourselves upon Your grace and mercy. We cast ourselves upon Your blood. Do not refuse us. We have nowhere else to go. We need nowhere else to go. Here in Your presence is where we belong. Here in Your presence is where we will remain. On You we will trust, and rest. On You we lay our hope for pardon, for purity, for life, and for salvation. If we perish, we perish on Your shoulders. If we sink, we sink in Your ship. If we die, we die on Your doorstep. Do not ask us to leave, for we will not leave. We will abandon ourselves to You, not from You. You alone are our Life, our Lord, our Everything.

God, I (We) Need You!
Grateful

The Way To Have Eternal Life

And this is the way to have eternal life—to know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the One You sent to earth.
-- John 17:3 (NLT)

Lord, I want to know You more!
Grateful

Which Way? The Way!

(13) "You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose the easy way. (14) But the gateway to life is small, and the road is narrow, and only a few ever find it."
-- Words of Warning from Jesus in Matthew 7:13-14 (NLT)

(3) "And this is the way to have eternal life—to know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the One You sent to earth."
-- Words Jesus Prayed to the Father in John 17:3 (NLT)

"I am The Way, The Truth, and The Life. No one can come to the Father except through Me."
-- Jesus' Declaration in John 14:6 (NLT)

Knowing You, my Lord, is the Narrow but Sure Entrance to Life.
Grateful

I Am But A Foreigner Here

(18) Open my eyes to see
the wonderful truths in Your law.
(19) I am but a foreigner here on earth;
I need the guidance of Your commands.
Don’t hide them from me!
-- Psalm 119:18-19 (NLT)

Lord, apart from Your guidance I would be a very lost soul in this life and especially in the life to come. Your Words alone make up the marvelous map for me to find The Way through this foreign world. In the Name of Jesus, The Way Home, I pray. Amen.

IF MY PEOPLE... WILL? I WILL! God's Promise in 2 Chron. 7:14.
Grateful

Do We Know The Way Home?

We have to come Home to Jesus before we can go Home with Jesus. -- James Spruill

"Let not your hearts be troubled; believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way where I am going." Thomas said to Him, "Lord, we do not know where You are going; how can we know the way?" Jesus said to him, "I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father, but by Me. -- Words of Jesus in John 14:1-6 (NRSV)

Lord, thank You for being our Way Home. Because there will be no sin in The Father's House, thanks for being our Way to find forgiveness for our sinful actions and cleansing of our Sinful attitudes. We can now know there's room for us There. We cannot adequately express our gratitude in knowing that the Way of Your Cross leads us to You and You lead us to our forever Home. Amen.

For God took the sinless Christ and poured into Him our sins. Then, in exchange, he poured God’s goodness into us! -- 2 Cor. 5:21 (TLB)

IF MY PEOPLE... WILL? I WILL! God's Promise in 2 Chron. 7:14.
Grateful

A Child of Faith, A Man of God

At a wedding rehearsal, the father of the groom stood to affirm his son who was about to be married. It has been all joy to raise Adam -- our child of faith became a man of God.

Train up a child in the way he should go,
And when he is old he will not depart from it.
-- Proverbs 22:6 (NKJV)

IF MY PEOPLE... WILL? I WILL! God's Promise in 2 Chron. 7:14.
Grateful