Joy and Strength (Christian life and music)

  My new Scripture Song based on 2 Thessalonians 3:3 and 1 John 5:18. ❤️

Think about it.  David danced wildly for the Lord in broad daylight, in public.  He was crazy about God.  His devotion for God was off the charts.  We know this not just through His glorious, raw, real, and even vindictive Psalms, but because God Himself tells us so.  David was a man after God's own heart. David wanted God. Another example of David's antics - he actually pretended to be insane!   "'So he [David] pretended to be insane in their presence; and while he was in their hands he acted like a madman, making marks on the doors of the gate and letting saliva run down his beard.  Achish said to his servants, “Look at the man! He is insane!'"  I Samuel 21:13-14 David was afraid for his life because King Achish was out to get him.  People do crazy things when they think their life is at stake. Some of David's Psalms are a bit mad, too.  Boy, did he want his enemies pulverized!  And he minced no words in letting God know how he felt and how he wanted God

Your calling as a Christian is not to do  something.  It is to belong fully to Christ. Out of that love connection, that abiding in Him, He will give you plenty to do!   But I believe that most Christians are acting out of a sense of obligation, duty, or even to look good before others. When God purifies our hearts, He purifies our motives.  How?  Because His motives are at work in and through and coming out of us.  Remember, none of us have anything at all of any good to offer Christ, or anyone else, in and of ourselves.  I realize this is a blow to your pride.  Oh well. Maybe the Scripture about wood, hay, and stubble doesn't matter to you.  You figure that you're "in" anyway with God, so just keep working works no matter if He is in them or not. But why settle for the Cracker Jack ring of tin when God has gold works for us to do? We must step out of the way.  This is a nice way of saying:  we must die.   Die to pride. Die to self-rightousness. Die to showing off be

So my New Year prayers started out with me telling God what to do. I only half jest.  As I prayed on my knees, pouring out my heart to Him, I wasn’t finding peace. I was feeling more turmoil than peace. Until... I finally blurted out, "Lord, I give You carte blanche with my life."  Then, sweet release. His beautiful peace filled my soul. It seems counterintuitive to how we are wired in the natural.  We all want some semblance of control over our lives.  But when you belong to the Lord, He leaves some things seemingly unresolved in your life.  I don't know all the reasons why He does this.  I only know that all He does is done in love.  Great love.  Everlasting love.  Holy love.  Righteous love.  Problem with us is that we've been sold a bill of goods as to what real love is.  So when God, in His perfect love, allows certain trials to linger in our lives, our rational, worldly, fleshly minds cannot understand why He would allow such seemingly harmful things to continue

I am so excited!  The Lord moved me to write a new Scripture Song.  Hot off the press!  The first of the New Year.  God is so good.  It is based on I Corinthians 1:18 & 21.   https://youtu.be/a8xYaL7wmHQ 18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 21 For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Sheet music and lead sheet coming soon! Love, Elizabeth