Frances Ridley Havergal, a poet and hymnwriter (“Take My Life and Let It Be”), published this book of devotions in 1879, shortly before her death. I do not know what edition I have, but it looks and feels like an early one.
A note written on an inside page reads, “With pleasant memories of Bible School, Summer of 1945, G. S. Montgomery.”
I once had a conversation at school with a first grade student. It was snack time, and, as she saw me approaching the eating area, the student called out to me:
“Mrs. McDavid, Mrs. McDavid!” Olivia’s hand was up and signaling for me to join her.
I walked over to her table and sat down. “What’s up?”
“Did you know that before, if we were at a school with all black people or a school with all white people, I couldn’t sit with you?”
Continue reading
This quote is taken from the last U.S. Senate prayer Peter Marshall wrote as chaplain before he died at age 46 in January 1949:
“Deliver us, our Father, from futile hopes and from clinging to lost causes, that we may move into ever-growing calm and ever-widening horizons. Where we cannot convince, let us be willing to persuade, for small deeds done are better than great deeds planned. We know that we cannot do everything. But help us to do something. For Jesus’ sake, Amen.”
Laura of Garden Answer doesn’t have a horticulture degree. She’s not a professional speaker, teacher, or business owner. She is a down-to-earth, dirt-loving, seed-spreading, soil-mixing soul who earned almost two million subscribers with her easygoing style.
Her successes come from a simple love for helping and watching plants grow. And the miraculous wonder of it all never seems to escape her. My kind of gardener.
Watch her videos here on YouTube.
(Image shows my rooted cuttings from a single plectranthus plant, about to be potted.)
As I was thinking about loved ones, the state of the world, life, death, and the upcoming new year, these words came to me.
Another year, so full of grace
Forgiveness, love, and peace
Of gifts that come from God the Father
And sent for you to keep
If only you would seek.
Another year of joyful triumph
And sudden grim defeat
You smile, embrace, you cry and tremble
The world and all it brings
If only you would seek.
Another year, come be His child
Beloved of the King
A year that flows with promises
And blessings you will reap
If only you would seek.
Another year, could be your last
And then eternity
There will only be one question
What will your answer be?
If only you would seek.
Another year to share with friends
With loving family
But if your heart would open further
He waits so patiently
If only you would seek.
"But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you."
Matthew 6:33
I’ve been able to read through the entire Bible every year using the Five Day Bible Reading Plan.
The mix of Old Testament and New Testament readings each day is the most enjoyable part of the plan for me. The chronological order is another plus.
You can download and print the reading plan, but I have the app linked to the ESV Study Bible app on my iPhone. With a touch, the app takes me to the passages for the day, and I use the supplied checklist to monitor my reading.
The weekends are “free” with this plan, giving you two days to dig deeper, catch up, focus on your church’s readings for Sunday, or do anything else that helps you grow in the knowledge of God through reading his Word.
Whichever Bible reading plan you choose, I hope you are successful this new year with your worthy goal.
Your word is a lamp to my feet
and a light to my path.
Psalm 119:105
Lynne is the firstborn of the six siblings in my family. She took the lead on many things, including caring for us when Mom and Dad were both either at work or out of action for one tragic reason or another.
In addition to that, she was also trying to grow up during a difficult time in American history: the 1960’s. Lynne was old enough to understand what was going on around the world and within our family.
She was in her teens and couldn’t find lipstick to complement her skin color.
She saw war, assassinations, and race riots through a thirteen-channel black and white television.
She stood in the welfare food line with Mom and knew exactly why she was there and her friends were not.
Lynne endured a lot. She must have decided that if she also had to put up with the five of us, then she was going to make good use of the time.
So we became her choir.
Lynne and my oldest brother Marvin were members of their school’s Glee Club, a group of students who met to sing and perform. Lynne would teach us what they learned, and one Christmas season she taught us how to sing Do You Hear What I Hear?
Written in October of 1962, the song was a plea for peace during the Cuban Missile Crisis. It has a precious melody wrapped around words of hope.
Lynne worked long and hard with us, and she was serious about her goal. She loved that song. She would sing the words and then make sure we repeated them in tune, correctly and clearly. She had no sheet music. There was no need for it: Lynne, like the rest of us, could pick notes out of the air. She had memorized what she learned at Glee Club. The music poured out of her heart and straight into ours.
And the words! I traveled the journey as I sang: From the sky to the lamb to the boy to the king to the Child. The description of the star “with a tail as big as a kite” and the song “with a voice as big as the sea” made me shiver with wonder.
Lynne went beyond teaching us just the melody. Besides the echo, there was a line that sang counterpoint to the last verse of the carol. There are no words, just an “Ahhh…,” in a soft and lilting melody.
And so, we sang. We followed our leader as she waved her hands and moved us through each verse. We had no audience. Our choir made its offering to the bedroom walls.
Yet we sang our hearts out, despite the overhanging gloom that poverty brings, for our sister’s reward and the pure pleasure and escape that singing brings.
Here are the words to the song:
Do You Hear What I Hear?
Said the night wind to the little lamb,
“Do you see what I see? (echo)
Way up in the sky, little lamb,
Do you see what I see? (echo)
A star, a star, dancing in the night
With a tail as big as a kite,
With a tail as big as a kite.”
Said the little lamb to the shepherd boy,
“Do you hear what I hear? (echo)
Ringing through the sky, shepherd boy,
Do you hear what I hear? (echo)
A song, a song high above the trees
With a voice as big as the sea,
With a voice as big as the sea.”
Said the shepherd boy to the mighty king,
“Do you know what I know? (echo)
In your palace warm, mighty king,
Do you know what I know? (echo)
A Child, a Child shivers in the cold–
Let us bring him silver and gold,
Let us bring him silver and gold.”
Said the king to the people everywhere,
“Listen to what I say! (echo)
Pray for peace, people, everywhere,
Listen to what I say! (echo)
The Child, the Child sleeping in the night
He will bring us goodness and light,
He will bring us goodness and light.”
“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). Matthew 1:23
Do You Hear What I Hear? lyrics by Noël Regney and music by Gloria Shayne Baker, 1962. Click here for the original recording by the Harry Simeone Chorale.
Published in 1928, this is a book of devotionals that the pastor (George W. Phillips) shared during the Tenth Avenue Baptist Church’s daily radio broadcasts, which began in 1926 out of Oakland, California. Besides the call letters standing for the church’s name, its on-air backronym was “Knowledge, Truth, and Beauty.”
Darla McDavid 