My twice-weekly custom is to walk outdoors with my friend Peggy. At the end of our walk Monday, I noticed a batch of small burrs on my pant legs. Since I had a class that evening and was running late, I ignored them at the time, then promptly forgot about them.Thursday, November 12, 2009
Fifty Ways to Leave Your Love Mark
My twice-weekly custom is to walk outdoors with my friend Peggy. At the end of our walk Monday, I noticed a batch of small burrs on my pant legs. Since I had a class that evening and was running late, I ignored them at the time, then promptly forgot about them.Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
A Prayer
How foolish and vain
When I desire anything but him.
For what, without Jesus, can the world
give me?
Let me love all things for the sake of Jesus
But let me love Jesus for his own sake.
ADAPTED FROM THE IMITATION OF CHRIST,
THOMAS À KEMPIS (1380–1471)
Read a meditation on this idea.
War Hymn*

In freedom’s psalm the poets weepWith prayer the day is towed to light
for lives that did not rhyme,
stopped short in prefixated sleep
a postscript spanning time. -JH
as songbirds rest on broken staff,
trill shrilly through the foggy gloom
where mortars shriek to clear the air.
The tremor in the watchman’s rasp
advances time. The hours sweep
o’er wounded in sharp pain and flat
upon their backs with pallid face.
While in the holes the soldiers sleep,
in freedom’s psalm the poets weep.
No faith is sung in church this day
The organ plays a silent dirge
collapsed in ruins on the stage
while tyrant’s goals go undeterred.
Discordant lines of frowning men
march by as bells refuse to chime.
Boots beat an unmelodic song,
from scores unsettled far too long.
Voices crescendo over time
and cry for lives that did not rhyme.
It echoes where the sons of hope
in victory cross the gruesome miles,
embellishes the verdant spring;
Ears now hear staccato cries.
The prisoners in black and white
crawl sickly grey from torture’s keep,
climb slow on free will’s crippled feet,
find home in requiem of loss.
Some shattered hearts no longer beat,
stopped short in prefixated sleep.
The bold in bars with bars upon
their chest sit down to drink away
all memory of ignoble days.
While back at home, the ladies wait
with rhythmic hum of ordered lives.
The drumbeat pulse of lives entwined
casts cords across the silvered sea,
pulls those back home who were preserved
a signature of freedom’s prime,
their love a postscript spanning time.
© Joyce Harback
November 11, 2009
*Poetry Form: A Glosa
Monday, November 09, 2009
Word Challenge Winner
Saturday, November 07, 2009
Cheery Ohs

red leaves burn before a blue backdrop
new crayons, fresh playdough
mown grass, campfire, crunchy golden delicious
primary colours, purple iris
ancient streams that move glacier speed through granite
gentle waves lapping at lake shore
effervescent soda sucked through crushed ice
dew under warm sunshine
sparkle of newborn drool
and childlike eyes
candlelight, Christmas lights
crunchy snow, tea, cozy quilt
slipping cold hands into a warm pocket,
chilled body into a warm bath
pumice-smooth feet, pinked toenails
chisel that removes unnecessary marble
fresh white writing pad under the firm grip of a yellow No. 2
rich black dirt blended by hand
a planted garden
anticipation of first crocus
grey Lava soap scraping grease from hard-worked fingers
tousled head pillowed on mother’s bosom
fresh cinnamon rolls
best friend’s smile
cold milk
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Why I Twitter
I twitter for the same reason I blog: I'm an explorer.
I follow poets, philosophers, sages, preachers and helpful people. I unfollow those who are selling products/services. I block people selling their body. I try to manage my time. I blog, then I send a tweet with the link. Just like a referee or linesman, a tweet on a whistle means something. So I try to make sure my tweets do. "Stop. Pay attention. Here's where you're going out of bounds." In the woods, on the mountain, I use a whistle to tweet very loudly so that the bears know I'm coming. Not constantly, because that would be annoying to my hiking companions and defeat the purpose of being in the quiet of nature. In cyberspace, I tweet very loudly about my faith once in a while. Not constantly, because that would be annoying to my Twitter companions.
It's not for everyone, but we're called to be salt and light, people. Shake it around, turn up the lamp. Choose your place, choose your technology (or not) but be ready always to give an answer to those who ask the reason for the hope that you have. Make sure you've first filled up and fueled up in God's word and His presence. Without that, you really have nothing eternally important to share.Desiring God
George Mueller is famous for establishing orphanages in England and joyfully depending upon God for his needs. My mother repeatedly sent me his article on "Ascertaining the Will of God" and it has been a wonderful guide throughout my life.Mueller explains in his autobiography how he would begin his day. Contrary to his reputation as a man of prayer, he said the first goal was not prayer or to see how much he might serve the Lord or glorify the Lord or preach to others. But rather, he said, his goal was "to become happy in the Lord" and discover how his soul, his inner man, might be nourished, just as he would nourish his outer man (physical body) with food. For 40 years, he gave himself "to the reading of the word of God and to meditation on it so that my heart would be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed." By meditating on it, his heart was brought into communion with the Lord and he would receive food for his soul.
"The result, I have found, to be almost invariably this," he said. "That after a very few minutes, my soul has been led to confession, or to thanksgiving, or to intercession, or to supplication. Though I did not, as it were, give myself to prayer but to meditation, it turned almost immediately, more or less, into prayer."
"Thus also," he continues, "the Lord is pleased to communicate that to me which very soon after I have found to become food for other believers though it was not for the sake of the public ministry of the word that I gave myself to meditation, but for the profit of my own inner man."
Perhaps this is where self-care is the most God-honoring thing we can do. Spending time, like Mary at Jesus' feet, choosing what is best, reveling in the delight of the Beloved.
The airlines have it right. You must put on your own oxygen mask before you assist those traveling with you. And we must "put on Christ" before we minister to others.
This excerpt from Mueller's autobiography is taken from chapter five of John Piper's book, Desiring God which Christian Audio is offering as their free audiobook download for November. To download your own copy, go to this link and using the code NOV2009 when prompted during checkout. It's free and simple to set up an account. The first seven minutes of Part 5 (in the m4b version) includes the Mueller excerpt from which I quoted above.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Time Well Wasted
Rights and Wrongs

I looked forward to sleeping in today but I slept all of 20 minutes extra. Habits die hard. At least I don't need to make breakfast and pack lunches, so I logged in to review a poem I'm writing. Before I got to it I checked email. Habits die hard.
"Man has a claim on God, a divine claim for any pain, want, disappointment, or misery that will help to make him what he ought to be. He has a claim to be punished, and to be spared not one pang that may urge him toward repentance; yea, he has a claim to be compelled to repent; to be hedged in on every side, to have one after another of the strong, sharp-toothed sheep-dogs of the Great Shepherd sent after him, to thwart him in any desire, foil him in any plan, frustrate him of any hope, until he comes to see at length that nothing will ease his pain, nothing make life a thing worth having, but the presence of the living God within him; that nothing is good but the will of God; nothing noble enough for the desire of the heart of man but oneness with the eternal. For this God must make him yield his very being, that He himself may enter in and dwell with him."
"nothing...but the presence of the living God within him."
And that is the greatest right and privilege of all.
Who needs to sleep in?
Bring on the sheepdogs.
.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Reason
For all the days you are sore
For all the things you’ve been seeking
The Lord has given you more.
For all the nights you are broken
For all the times you feel lost
For all the words left unspoken
God paved the path to the cross.
In suffering there is a reason
A purpose for feeling alone
Your tears may last for a season
His arms will carry you home.
© Joyce Harback
Feel free to link to this post but if you copy or reprint please ask first.
For the Brokenhearted

Psalm 130: 1,2,5
Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD; O Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy. I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope.
Psalm 34:18
The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.
Psalm 69:20
Scorn has broken my heart and has left me helpless; I looked for sympathy, but there was none, for comforters, but I found none.
Psalm 147:3
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.
Hebrews 4:15-16
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one (Jesus) who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
excerpts from Psalm 13 (A Lament)
How long, O LORD ? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? …Look on me and answer, O LORD my God. Give light to my eyes…I trust in your unfailing love…


