Grains of Sand

I just received a box of business cards. I know, what does a retired person who has no business need with business cards? I might be a victim of good advertising—or at least persistent advertising—but I did it anyway. I didn’t order 500 as was suggested—I’m not quite that foolish—I’ll be dead and gone before I ever gave away that many! But while I was designed my card, I had the option of putting something on the back side of it. Three words came to mind and here they appear again in my verse for today. “ Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always .” (1 Chronicles 16:11) In the context in which this verse was recorded, David is celebrating the arrival of the ark in Jerusalem. The verse is part of a song of praise (16:8-36) written to remind the people of God just Who this God is, and all that He has blessed them with as a nation. It is well worth the reading, and the singing—you can make up the music as you go along—I’m sure David won’t mind if you change his melody a li...

Someone doesn’t get it. Someone doesn’t see the link between the Premier of this province celebrating her victory in getting beer sold in grocery stores by buying a six-pack in front of the cameras, with encouraging drunk drivers, domestic violence and under-aged drinking. Someone doesn’t see the connection between allowing physician assisted suicide for terminally ill twelve-year-olds with the probability of an even higher rate of teenage suicides brought on by depression and hopelessness. One pain is as real as the other. Someone doesn’t see that legalizing marijuana for “medical” purposes is not the message delivered in the advertising by its proponents, advertising that doesn’t depict dying, pain-ridden people in hospital beds, but perfectly healthy young adults smiling through the euphoric haze of their addictions. They just don’t get it. How can you facilitate the purchase of alcohol as though it were an acceptable part of our daily menu and then pretend to be concerned about i...

Athabasca Falls I stood on the landing outside of the sanctuary of my church yesterday. There was a lull in the traffic and no one for me to greet. I glanced at the space over the entrance and read the words from Psalm 29:2 written on a banner that has been hanging there since the 1960s. “ Worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness .” This morning my reading was from Psalm 29. I was reminded of the banner but I was also reminded of something else as I read the psalm. Last week I traveled with friends to Alberta, Canada. We spent a wonderful week exploring the beauties of the parks of Jasper and Banff. One of the places we stopped was Athabasca Falls. Psalm 29:3-5 reminded me of those mighty waters, their breathtaking power and beauty. “ The voice of the LORD is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the LORD, over many waters. The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the LORD is full of majesty. The voice of the LORD breaks the cedars; the LORD breaks the...

Google Images  Above the entrance to our church’s auditorium there is a banner with this Scripture verse painted on it: “ Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness ” (1 Chronicles 16:29 JKV). We always considered that a reminder of what God expects of us as His followers—holiness. The more modern translations of the Scriptures render this verse like this: “ Worship the Lord in the spender of his holiness ” (1 Chronicles 16:29 NIV, emphasis mine). While it is true that as followers of Jesus our lives need to be patterned after His—after all we are commanded to be holy as He is holy (1 Peter 1:16 among many others). the context of this verse from Chronicles highlights, not who we are, or should be, but who God is. The scene is David’s song of praise on the occasion of the return of the ark of the covenant to Jerusalem. As David consolidated his kingdom, one of the first orders of business was to return the people to the worship of the Lord their God. David’s ambition was to bu...