Revived! The Moon and the Stars!

Last night we saw the beautiful full moon through the mist, and I marveled at how intricate the creation is.  

The same God who created is the same God who saves sinners through Jesus.  He has once again gently reminded me how He holds all of this life in His hands.  

Trusting Him anew!  I am revived again!

*

Psalm 8

O Lord, our Lord,

How majestic is Your name in all the earth,

Who have displayed Your splendor above the heavens!

From the mouth of infants and nursing babes You have established strength

Because of Your adversaries,

To make the enemy and the revengeful cease.

When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers,

The moon and the stars, which You have ordained;

What is man that You take thought of him,

And the son of man that You care for him?

Yet You have made him a little lower than God,

And You crown him with glory and majesty!

You make him to rule over the works of Your hands;

You have put all things under his feet,

All sheep and oxen,

And also the beasts of the field,

The birds of the heavens and the fish of the sea,

Whatever passes through the paths of the seas.

O Lord, our Lord,

How majestic is Your name in all the earth!

*

Trusting God! and "wearing my sorrow with obedient grace!"

Sometime

Sometime, when all life’s lessons have been learned, 

And sun and stars forevermore have set,

The things which our weak judgments here have spurned,
The things o’er which we grieved with lashes wet,
Will flash before us out of life’s dark night, 
As stars shine most in deeper tints of blue;
And we shall see how all God’s plans are right,
And how what seemed reproof was love most true.

And we shall see how, while we frown and sigh,
God’s plans go on as best for you and me;
How, when we called, He heeded not our cry,
Because His wisdom to the end could see.
And e’en as prudent parents disallow
Too much of sweet to craving babyhood, 
So God, perhaps, is keeping from us now
Life’s sweetest things, because it seemeth good.

And if, sometimes, commingled with life’s wine,
We find the wormwood, and rebel and shrink,
Be sure a wiser hand than yours or mine
Pours out the potion for our lips to drink;
And if some friend you love is lying low,
Where human kisses cannot reach his face,
Oh, do not blame the loving Father so,
But wear your sorrow with obedient grace!

And you shall shortly know that lengthened breath
Is not the sweetest gift God sends His friend,
And that, sometimes, the sable pall of death
Conceals the fairest boon His love can send;
If we could push ajar the gates of life,
And stand within, and all God’s workings see,
We could interpret all this doubt and strife, 
And for each mystery could find a key.

But not today.  Then be content, poor heart;
God’s plans, like lilies pure and white, unfold;
We must not tear the close-shut leaves apart, —
Time will reveal the chalices of gold.
And if, through patient toil, we reach the land
Where tired feet, with sandals loosed, may rest,
When we shall clearly see and understand,
I think that we will say, “God knew the best!”

May Riley Smith