All the promises of God...

For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us. Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us is God, who also has sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. 2 Corinthians 1:20-22

Seek Him that maketh the seven stars and Orion, and turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night: that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The LORD is his name! Amos 5:8

A father of the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy habitation. God sets the solitary in families; He brings out those who are bound into prosperity... Psalm 68:5

For the LORD has chosen Zion; He has desired it for His dwelling place: "This is My resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it. I will abundantly bless her provision; I will satisfy her poor with bread." Psalm 132:13-15

The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your soul in a sun-scorched land, and strengthen your bones; you shall be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail. Isaiah 58:11

Selah!

At stake for Israel: the right to exist

A fuel tank burns in southern Lebanon.

A moment of truth

This war upon Israel provides a moment of clarity for the world. David Horowitz writes that it is a "Moment of truth" for Americans and freedom-loving people everywhere. His words are prophetic and incisive:

Americans need to take a hard look at what is going on in the Middle East, because it provides the clearest picture possible of the war we are in. On one side are al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hizbollah, Syria and Iran and their allies: Russia, France, Greece, and the UN majority. On the other is the only democracy in the land of Muslim and Arab terror. The origins of this front in the war on terror are crystal clear: the desire of the Muslim terrorists -- the elected majority among Palestinian Arabs and the occupying Shi'ite army in Lebanon, backed by Syria and Iran -- to destroy Israel and push the Jews into the sea.

The war reveals the impossibility of a Palestinian state and the necessity of a civilized occupying force in a region that is populated by a people who have been terminally brainwashed into an ideology of hate, which makes their self-government a crime waiting to happen.

There were 10,000 Jews living in Gaza until recently. They were so creative that while representing less than one percent of the population they accounted for 10% of the entire gross national product of the country. Productive and law-abiding as they were, their existence in Gaza required a Israeli army presence to protect them. So uncontrollable is the genocidal hatred of Palestinians for Jews (more than a million Palestinians on the other hand live peacefully in Israel enjoying more rights than any Arabs or Muslims living in their own countries). The Israeli army in Gaza was also necessary to prevent genocidal Palestinians Jew-haters from lobbing rockets into Israeli schoolyards.

Eventually, the Israeli leadership made a decision to capitulate to Arab Jew hatred and uproot the Jews living in Gaza, and to withdraw the forces that protected Israel from being attacked by Arab criminals. In the months that followed, the Arabs did nothing to improve their new homeland, which they now controlled completely. Instead, they elected genocidal terrorists to govern them. They destroyed the horticulture industry the Jews had created and that provided 10% of their GNP. They lobbed 800 or so rockets into Israel. During all this mayhem no word of condemnation for the Gaza aggressors came from the UN, France, Russia and rest of the Jew-hating, terrorist-appeasing and terrorist-supporting international community.

Consequently, the Hamas army command, based in Syria, authorized a further aggression -- a tunnel into Israel and the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier. For good measure, Palestinians in the West Bank executed an 18-year old Jewish hitch-hiker for the crime of being a Jew. Still no condemnation of the Palestinians from the Jew-haters in France, Russia and at the UN. This support encouraged Iranian-sponsored Hizbollah to initiate another aggression, this time from the north...

Read the whole thing. It's time the truth is told about the war foisted upon Israel -- silent and deadly most of the time, now it has boiled over into open conflict; yet this conflict is only a sign of what is to come, if this Jew hating terror is not stopped -- in its local iterations and its theocratic patron states of terror.

Israel has withdrawn from all "occupied territories," and still she is relentlessly attacked -- yea, attacked even more since she withdrew!

What does this tell you about the aims of the people who attack her?

Are we willing to see the truth?

Selah.

The world's first 3D crop circle

The world's first 3D crop circle appeared in an Oxfordshire wheatfield this week. It is a stunning work of art, an intricate formation 360 ft in diameter that weaves the grain together in a manner heretofore unseen. The formation appears as if one is looking down on skyscrapers from above.

Put thou thy trust in God

Put thou thy trust in God

Words: Mitre Hymn Book, 1836
based on John Wesley's 1739 paraphrase of a text
by Paul Gerhardt, 1653 "Befiehl du deine Wege"
Tune: Doncaster

Put thou thy trust in God,
in duty's path go on;
walk in His strength with faith and hope,
so shall thy work be done.

Commit thy ways to Him,
thy works into His hands,
and rest on His unchanging Word,
who heaven and earth commands.

Though years on years roll on,
His covenant shall endure;
though clouds and darkness hide His path,
the promised grace is sure!

Give to the winds thy fears;
hope, and be undismayed:
God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears;
God shall lift up thy head!

Through waves and clouds and storms
His power will clear thy way:
wait thou His time; the darkest night
shall end in brightest day.

Leave to His sovereign sway
to choose and to command;
so shalt thou, wondering, own His way,
how wise, how strong His hand!

Alleluia!

Thou wilt keep her in perfect peace

Thou wilt keep her in perfect peace,
whose mind is stayed on Thee;
because she trusteth in Thee.
Trust in the LORD forever,
for in YAH, the LORD, is everlasting strength!
[cf. Isaiah 26:3-4]

Testing whether that nation can long endure

High tide of the Confederacy ends at a stone wall
in a Pennsylvania field [Mort Kunstler painting]

The meaning of the 4th of July

In the hot afternoon sun of 3 July 1863, Federal troops turned back Pickett's final, desperate assault on the center of Union lines at Gettysburg. The smoke of the cannons blotted out the sun, turning it into an eerie red ball hanging in the summer sky; the thunder of shot and shell, cannister and exploding ordinance joined in incessant, deadly chorus with the crashing fire of muskets and rifles: souls streamed toward heaven's door from such battlefield destruction never seen before on human soil.

Waves of shot and shell ripped through the ripening wheat as the fixed, glistening lines of proud Confederate warriers marched through the valley of harvest: "There go the boys that will march through your lines!" one Conderate medic told a wounded Union prisoner. And march they did, to the very gates of hell it seemed, but not through Federal lines that day...

The attack crossed a mile of open field, enduring horrid casualties, briefly pierced the center line at the stone wall, wavered...then fell back: broken, blood poured out like water on shattered wheat -- once waving wheat now flattened under continuous cannon concussion, splattered with the blood of a divided nation.

But what did this fateful attack at Gettysburg mean? And how did it affect that glorious Independance declared 87 years earlier on July 4?

Had the attack succeeded, had Gettysburg ended in Confederate victory, Conderate General Robert E. Lee already had drawn up cease-fire partition plans to submit to President Lincoln in Washington. And such was the state of the war that such "seperate but equal" plan undoubtedly would have been supported by Congress: already Lincoln stood very alone in his resolve of a unified America free of slavery: a war-time President, he carried the weight of the war on his shoulders, to the constant vilification of media and political enemies.

The nation would have been split -- if not irrevocably, at least for a foreseeable future -- and all this would have meant for a world that so desperately needed a whole America.

"A house divided against itself cannot stand," said One who walked this human sod; and a divided house could not have stood against lurking totalitarian evil: the evil within our own national breast threatened our intended power against the evil that would sweep over the world a few decades later.

"Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people," said the prophets.

There, in the rolling fields of Gettysburg, the result of sin was seen in spades -- surely angels wept in the shattered atmosphere, where souls lingered in silent tears. Yet mercy was also poured out with the valiant blood: a nation yet stood, Independence still meant light for the world. July 4 now meant far, far more to a fledgling nation, nation humbled under Almighty hand.

When word of Gettysburg [and Vicksburg] reached Lincoln on the 7th, he stood in the early evening of Washington, sober and humble. He spoke to gathered persons and reporters, but was so humble, and so overcome with emotion, that he could only speak a few sentences: he said something to the effect that such occasion demanded a speech so eloquent that he was not up to the task.

He knew the truth: a nation had been preserved.

And later, in his humility, he spoke words worthy of a day of Freedom, words only he could have written and spoken:

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battle field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Happy Independance Day, America!

May we never forget the meaning of July 4, and how this meaning has been measured and defended in blood on subsequent July 4ths -- a new birth of freedom. May we take renewed devotion to the task yet before us, pleading the grace of God!

And may we never lack in standing against evil in our own time, in our own hearts...

Selah.

Like dew from the womb of the morning

A place of rest and power

Sit at My right hand
Psalm 110:1-5

The Lord said to my lord, ‘Sit at my right hand,
until I make your enemies your footstool.'
The Lord will send the sceptre of your power out of Zion,
saying, ‘Rule over your enemies round about you.
‘Princely state has been yours
from the day of your birth,
in the beauty of holiness have I begotten you,
like dew from the womb of the morning.’
The Lord has sworn and he will not recant:
‘You are a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.’

“Sit at my right hand, until I make...your footstool.”

This devotional reading from Monday still echoes in me. “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.” But why? Isn’t this a Messianic passage, properly interpreted in the full revelation of the Christ, Jesus? Indeed, it is. And yet its words still ring: Sit at My right hand…!

Is there a derivative meaning here, for children of Messiah? I think so. As I pondered the inner meaning of this verse, several themes began to develop – Scriptural themes of high truth, further relation to God, the Holy One.

“Sit at My right hand…” implies a posture of rest; one might call it a command of rest…and not just any kind of rest, but a rest of faith. It is rest at the “right hand,” i.e. the place of divine authority and will, stillness in divine power and favor. Consider what it means to rest in divine favor and will [cf. Psalm 37, “delight in the LORD!”].

This kind of rest contains active and passive conditions.

The resting child is passive concerning the conventional defense of self, its desires and aims: the divine power is what defends, i.e. “until I make your enemies your footstool.” However, this posture is alien to the modern mindset. Promotion of “number one” is considered a God-given right in our culture. Number one is its own justification in the natural human mind. And yet the divine rest strikes this impulse head-on!

This brings to mind the words of Isaiah, where he talks about the doomed mechanism of “lighting one’s own fires.” The Light of lights must be our referent for action, not our own lesser lights – such is the avenue of divine favor.

However, though this rest is passive toward self-justification, we must never forget that it means action toward the defense of others. The appeal is toward the sovereign authority of God, and yet the action is obedience. True rest in regards of our own needs/desires means that we spring to active obedience when faced with the needs of others.

The resting child seeks divine justice, and sees this call in the eyes of other, needy children.

We act in tandem with God for the defense of others, all the while resting in divine favor regarding our own needs. We just might be the means whereby God answers the prayers of other children, those waiting at His right hand in desperate prayer!

Therefore, when you perceive a need in another, do your best to meet it, to act in the name of Christ. It may be as simple as a word spoken, a small gift given, a prayer, a card, a note, a gesture, a token of love: whatever it means to be obedient to the divine voice for others, that is what we give.

And this is rest at the right hand of Abba!

Honestly, what keeps us from obedience? Is it not the sapping focus on our own needs and limitations? Such improper focus is cured in divine rest at the right hand – we are freed from self-defense to the life-giving defense of others.

Thus does the kingdom come, like dew from the womb of the morning!

Children of the Lord King, Jesus Christ, can learn of Abba, and learn of rest, in this kingly verse: Sit at My right hand until I make your enemies your footstool!

Alleluia!

• What if we rested like this in relation to the needs of Hopegivers orphanage?
• What if we rested like this in relation to the justice needs in communities close to home?
• What if we rested like this in relation to the inner needs of our friends and families?
• What if we rested like this in relation to the personal needs that keep us from soaring?

Like this, how many enemies would be trodden under foot, in miracle time?

Selah.

To wear or not to wear? that is the question!

To wear or not to wear a helmet?

Since Steeler QB Ben Roethlisberger cracked up his Suzuki this week, brushing death while not wearing a helmet, the topic of motorcycle helmets has filled the air. It’s the topic du jour in Western PA!

But before I address the debate of helmet vs. no helmet, a word or two about Ben’s accident: I don’t think that Ben can be blamed in this accident, as it was clearly the fault of the other driver; she failed to yield the right of way, crossing over into the other lane. And, in a larger sense, I don’t think that Ben can be blamed for not wearing a helmet: PA laws were rescinded for a reason, and the Steelers front office refused to forbid this exact practice, specifically, even though knowing about it. I don’t agree with piling on Ben, at all: his life came a whisker from ending, with other scars still with him; he’ll be wearing a partial plate or tooth implants the rest of his life, with his jaw held together by titanium plates and screws, together with damaged nasal canal and nose bones, and a brain more susceptible to concussion/damage. Ben has paid in spades for this, even though he is alive and better than anyone could have expected – a very tough price to pay for an accident not your fault!

But the accident does bring up the question: should I wear a helmet or not, while biking?

It’s an interesting debate, as PA recently rescinded its helmet laws, making helmet wearing optional. So why did PA make helmet laws optional? Is it a state filled with death-wish riders? No, it’s not that easy…

Consider the basic position of those against helmets. A poster by the name of “Rockman” argues passionately against wearing a helmet. It seems counterintuitive, but he is convinced that it hurts chances of survival.

As a member of ABATE OF OHIO I would like you to know that we have been fighting helmet laws for many years for a very good reason: They kill people. The accident yesterday could have been deadly if big Ben were wearing a helmet. Does anyone remember how Dale Earnhart died? In case you don’t it was the force created by the weight of his helmet when he hit the wall. The same could have happened to Ben if he were wearing a helmet. The rules of NASCAR now dictate that the drivers use a Hahns device because of this. There is no way to connect a Hahns device to a motorcycle. I don’t want to say that a helmet is a bad thing, but do want those of you who don’t ride to understand that there is a very good reason many of us don’t wear helmets. Some riders do some don’t, but it should be the riders’ choice, not some one with an agenda that doesn’t even ride to decide…LET THOSE WHO RIDE DECIDE.

Let those who ride decide, for their own lives! That pretty much sums up the case against wearing a helmet: the extra weight of the helmet is said to put the neck at greater risk for breaking. On this and similar arguments, bikers have successfully lobbied Pennsylvania State laws to where helmets are now optional for most riders.

However, the case for helmets is made just as passionately – other bikers supporting their arguments with graphic stories. JimSteeler responds to the argument against helmets by calling it “BS,” and offering his personal crash testimony:

Now that is pure BS that he is better off because he was not wearing a helmet!

I had my rear brakes lock up on me one time going 65 mph and I was heading straight for a concrete wall with a chain link fence above it. My life passed before me and when I bought my first bike at 16 years old the Italian guy who sold it to me said this to me: "If you wreck a motorcycle, know you wreck a motorcycle and do nothing but wreck a motorcycle, kick away, kick away!" He was Ernest Cerini Sr. from Donora, Pa.

When that point in my life passed by I dove off the bike and belly slid into the wall. I had a facemask on at the time. I can remember watching asphalt slide under my face and felt the heat from the friction on my nose being smashed against the face shield. When I hit the wall with my head the helmet was dented pretty deep, almost cracked and you could not even see through the face shield. I had a badly broken arm that took a bone transplant from my hip to repair, but I had no head injury whatsoever, not even a concussion. My first words when I got up were "my God! I'm alive.”

THE HELMET AND ERNEST CERINI SAVED MY LIFE…

I cannot believe we have laws that require you to wear a seatbelt when surrounded by metal and have airbags, but you can ride a motorcycle without a helmet.

Then again there is a need for more organ donors.

And, that sums pretty well the argument for wearing a helmet.

So what’s a self-respecting rider supposed to do? Both of these positions have logical points: Yes, the face/skull cracks like a nutshell even at lower speeds. And, yes, the physics of added helmet weight can add potentially deadly force to the neck area [cf. Hahns device in NASCAR racing]. So what to do?

Well, several things I would just toss into the equation for an informed decision [informed with a blend of physics and modern technology]: 1. Helmet technology is improving, as our knowledge in alloys and aerospace textile hybrids increases. As the technology improves, the protection increases while the weight decreases: an inverse proportion of life-saving value. 2. The physics raised by Rockman, where the helmet adds force to the head and snaps the neck [viz., the sad example of Dale Earnheart], is more at risk for when the body stays stationary while the head keeps moving. In other words, it is far more likely that a race car driver [with his body secured by belts] is at risk from this destructive force than a biker: in a bike wreck, the body is often unrestrained, traveling with the head and neck until impact. Of course, depending on the physics of the crash, if the body is somehow stopped and the head still moving, then the risk remains. All in all, though, the odds of biking favor the helmet, from a purely statistical/physical point of view.

I wouldn’t wear a helmet in racecar without a Hahns device; but have no problem wearing a helmet on a bike.

The best answer, I believe, is to take advantage of helmet technology – to wear a light-weight and aerospace-informed cover: it gives face/skull protection at a fraction of the weight of older helmets, and reduces the chance of negative force on the spine/neck. Add leg armor like this, and it’s a Frodo-like chance against the Orcan spear!

So there’s your hot-topic word from Thoughts of Loy! To wear or not to wear? That is the question. Who knew the answer would be so easy? :-)

And free, no less!

:-)

Safe and happy riding, to you!

The One who makes a way

Behold, the heavens and heaven above the heavens cannot contain Thee!
How much less this house which I have built?

So He led them through the depths, as through a wilderness...
He led them by a straight way, that they might come to a place of habitation.

Ever living God

Ever living God
Maker of all the Earth
Everlasting King, our eternal praise belongs to You
All of the honor
All of the glory to You

You are wonderful, marvelous, forever
Beautiful, Prince of Peace, faithful One, forever…

Ever living God
Maker of all the Earth
Everlasting King, our eternal praise belongs to You
All of the honor
All of the glory to You

You are wonderful, marvelous, forever
Beautiful, Prince of Peace, faithful One, forever…

Take the place of all honor, take the place above all thrones,
Take the place of all power –
You are the One, glorious!

You are wonderful, marvelous, forever
Beautiful, Prince of Peace, faithful One, forever!

No insignificant people

My God, with His lovingkindness, will meet me.
Psalm 59:10, RV of 1901

No insignificant people
Amy Carmichael

To some of us, there often comes such a sense of the vastness of things and of our own insignificance that it can be a shaking thing. It can even shake our faith in the truth that our Father regards with compassion even the fall of a single sparrow.

To me, one of the proofs that God’s hand is behind and all throughout this marvelous Book we know as the Bible is the way it continually touches upon this very fear in us – the fear that we are so insignificant as to be forgotten. That we are nothing. Unconsciously, His Word meets this fear, and answers it – not always by direct statement, but often by giving a simple, loving story.

Daniel, for instance, was so overwhelmed by this supernatural vision of the vast, majestic march of history and the glory of the Lord that his physical strength vanished – until “a hand touched me” (Daniel 8:8-10).

John, looking through the thin veil of time into eternity, saw his Lord – the Lord he had seen pierced – now holding in His hand seven stars. John declares, “I fell at His feet as though dead.” Immediately – just as though this fallen one mattered more than the seven stars, as though there were no stars – “He placed His right hand on upon me (Revelation 1:16-17).

Isn’t it beautiful that there was no rebuke at all for their human weakness? And there never is a rebuke for our weaknesses either. “The soul of the wounded calls for help, and God does not regard it as foolish” (Job 24:12, Rotherham).

He comforts. He lays His right hand on the soul wounded by weariness, or fear, or any kind of weakness at all. And He says, as if that one were the only soul in the universe:

O man, greatly beloved, fear not: peace be unto thee. Be strong – yea, be strong! (Daniel 10:19, Rotherham)

Alleluia!

I will lift up my eyes...

I will lift up my eyes to the hills;
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
Maker of heaven and earth!

He will not allow your foot to be moved;
He who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold! He who keeps Israel
Shall neither slumber nor sleep.

The LORD is your keeper,
The LORD is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not smite you by day,
Nor the moon by night.

The LORD shall preserve you from all evil;
He shall preserve your soul:
The LORD shall preserve your going out and coming in,
From this time forth and even forevermore!

Alleluia!

Selah.

Thoughts between daughter and Father

BE OCCUPIED IN THE GREATEST THINGS

The daughter, though consoled by the love of her Lord, found herself so preoccupied by…disillusionment that she was bound in spirit and not free for her rightful work. But her God uncovered her eyes, and she saw this preoccupation as a bond from which the Spirit of Liberty was waiting to unbind her.

And she knew that she must be occupied in the greatest things. She was doing a great work and she could not come down to those little things. If they did not seem little things to her, she must ask herself this question: Was He whom she called Master and Lord always understood? Was He never misjudged? They laid to His charge things that He knew not, to the great discomfiture of His spirit. Is it not enough for the disciple to be as her Master and the servant as her Lord?

THE SECRET OF CONTINUED ENDURANCE

The daughter asked, “What is the secret of continued endurance?”

Her Father answered,

“It is found in seeing Him who is invisible. It is found in looking at the joy that is set before thee. It is found in considering Him who endured. It is found in taking for thine own the words of one who was tempted to wax faint: ‘In the day when I cried Thou answered me, and strengthened me with strength in my soul.’ It is found in staking thine all upon the lightest word of the Lord, thy Redeemer. It is found in loyalty. It is found in love.”

HAST THOU COME TO THE END OF MY RESOURCES?

Her thoughts said, “My enemies live and are mighty; and yet I have requested that they, even mine enemies, shall not triumph over me or over those whom Thou hast given me, my Father, for they are Thine. But I have come to the end of my resources.”

Her Father said,

“Hast thou come to the end if My resources? Is the Lord’s hand shortened? Dost thou not know Him whom thou hast believed? Art thou not persuaded that He is able to keep that which thou hast committed unto Him? Know thy Lord and thy heart shall find repose in Him. Thine enemies shall not triumph over thee or over those whom I have given thee.”

And the daughter said, “I will cry unto God most high, unto God that performeth all things for me, even the cause that I have in hand. Lord, all my desire is before Thee!”

Note: Prayer thoughts from Amy Carmichael, writing from India, where she singlehandly stood against the racist caste system, rescuing young girls from ritual Hindu temple prostitution -- at risk of her own life. Countless redemptive miracles were wrought from her prayer life... here is a glimpse into that inner beauty, beauty which can lead us in our own relation and work!

The heavens declare

The heavens declare the glory of God,
The firmament showeth His handiwork;
Day unto day they pour forth speech,
Night unto night they show forth knowledge:
There is no speech or language
Where their voice is not heard!

The BANA project: A miracle begins with a gift!

BANA means children

Ladell Patterson
Logos Global Ministries

Bana means children in the Sesotho language. Bana: the children of Lesotho, Africa, who need real care! Bana: the life-giving focus of Logos Global Ministries [LGM], which now cares for hundreds of AIDS orphans, leveraging indigenous networks for critical training and care. LGM has quietly become a permanent presence in this desperate country, working through its Lesotho arm, THE BANA PROJECT OF LESOTHO, to offer hope in the midst of seemingly hopeless circumstances. These people are threatened on every side for daily existence. For them the Bana Project is a miracle of hope: Loving eyes that look to the children, see their desperate needs, and offer them a better future.

The project is currently supplying Basotho Blankets to help the children during the winter months, which are now beginning. The highland winters of Lesotho can be brutal. The lowlands around the capital city, Maseru, experience a mild winter even though the temperature drops below freezing most nights. But in the highlands the people and animals die by the hundreds: a lack of fuel or money for its purchase means deadly results. During such drastic times, snow and wind bring unthinkable hardship for the locals. We only pray that it will not be one of those winters!

The need is great, but God is raising up people around the world, people called to join LGM in the battle for orphans. Just last week a prominent lady of the community in Lesotho came to the site where the children are cared for and brought with her a load of used clothing. There seems to be no other way to get used clothing into the country, so this lady was a Godsend. Her charity will do more than warm the bodies of the small children: Their hearts also are feeling the comfort of good clothing.

A month ago a lady called me with an offer to build a large garden project for the orphans – with another $50,000 gift! Fresh vegetables and fruit are of great nutritional value if they contain no contaminates or polluted ingredients left there by pesticides: Lesotho struggles with the quality control that we take for granted here in the USA. However, this garden project will now make healthy produce a reality!

Several months ago someone offered a gift of $50,000 for a sewing factory so that the ladies of the community could make school uniforms for those who do not have them. Education is such an important part of the orphans hope! Now they will have uniforms manufactured by their village peers.

A friend with extensive exposure to LGM, who has offered timely counsel, advice and encouragement, recently donated $1100 for the project. And God continues to whisper on the night wind, calling caring hearts to stand in the gap, and stand for this project.

We’re also learning the lesson of fed multitudes in Galilee, where Jesus took a small boy’s lunch and fed five thousand and more. This miracle principle is echoing greater and greater for Lesotho: Little by little we receive 10 dollars here, five dollars there, 50 or a hundred…slowly moving toward our original goal: to find 1 million people to give $5. Youth groups and other groups are starting a campaign to see how many $1 bills we can raise, all for the orphan care project!

We are still praying that a large grant will come to us, like $5 million, or more. I feel confident that it will happen on God’s timetable, but until then we count the blessings of miracles already come, of lives already changed.

You are invited to join us in prayer, for it alone will continue the success that has already come to Logos Global Ministries. Here are a number of things you can pray:

• God, give us that mountain we have prayed for so long. Drive back the forces of evil that refuse us access. Show LGM Your plans and make it all happen, according to Your will.
• Lord, continue to speak to those whom You want involved in the project. Visit those who have already answered with Your Holy presence. Guide them daily as they prepare mentally and spiritually for their assignments.
• Father, will You open the windows of heaven upon The Bana Project of Lesotho to supply all their needs? I know You will, for You have promised over and over again that You care for the orphans as Your own children. In this promise and on Your character we hold them up in prayer.
• Almighty God, Creator of all things, will You surround and support the little children in Lesotho who have no parents to care for them? When they are hungry, help LGM to be there. When winter sets in, keep them warm with Your love. Completely meet their needs through the church and through your chosen vessels. We ask these things in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, for the sake of Your children and for Your glory. AMEN!

God bless you for your prayers, and for your concern! Remember that a miracle begins with a gift – sometimes even a gift that seems so small will begin a blessing that reaches hundreds and thousands of lives. So hear the call! Join the project as God leads you, and together we’ll make a large difference in Lesotho.

Yours in Christ and for the Kingdom,

Ladell Patterson
Note: This article was written in consultation with Loy

The worlds of nature and of grace

HYMN: Behold the glories of the Lamb

Words: Isaac Watts, 1688
Tune: St. Fulbert

Behold the glories of the Lamb
amidst His Father's throne.
Prepare new honors for His Name,
and songs before unknown.

Let elders worship at his feet,
the Church adore around,
with vials full of odors sweet,
and harps of sweeter sound.

Those are the prayers of the saints,
and these the hymns they raise;
Jesus is kind to our complaints,
He loves to hear our praise.

Eternal Father, who shall look
into Thy secret will?
Who but the Son should take that book
and open every seal?

He shall fulfill Thy great decrees,
the Son deserves it well;
Lo, in His hand the sovereign keys
of heaven, and death, and hell!

Now to the Lamb that once was slain
be endless blessings paid;
salvation, glory, joy remain
forever on Thy head.

Thou hast redeemed our souls with blood,
hast set the prisoner free;
hast made us kings and priests to God,
and we shall reign with Thee.

The worlds of nature and of grace
are put beneath Thy power;
then shorten these delaying days,
and bring the promised hour!

The BANA project for Lesotho orphans

I’ve been encouraged recently, hearing about the BANA project for Lesotho orphans. The project is working in a non-traditional manner, using indigenous networks to reach the local orphans. Ladell Patterson is leading the project here in the U.S.A., soon to be in Lesotho, with a heart aflame for the cause. On a recent administrative visit, he and his son Allen found far more than they expected! Listen to his moving description of the event:

The rains had returned with a vengeance. Now we looked at the Lesotho lakes, ponds and gullies full and running…as if there had never been a shortage of rain. The entire country bloomed greener that I have ever seen it… Crops peaked through the formerly parched soil – a visible answer to prayer…

But the crop-giving rains turned the roads to mud! The car slipped and slid down to Tsikane's home and we wondered how on earth we would climb out the next day. Immediately we received word: You are to speak to the village chiefs and committees regarding the BANA project! So we prepared, with only two hours to spare.

Then the outpouring of hope captured our hearts. Some 800 people greeted us, surrounding us and crying their happy cry – dancing around, shaking and kissing our hands. Some of them had never met me and this was Allen's first group gathering to experience. What a greeting! I was not aware what was about to happen.

Tsikane introduced us and said a few words about our hearts and our vision. Allen spoke a few words of thanks and encouragement towards the project. As I walked forward to speak my heart suddenly leaped within me! I was so moved to see such a large delegation awaiting us. They had come from all 17 villages where we are working. A news reporter joined the crowd, along with the steering committee of the whole project. A representative from the chief’s office was there and many, many other people. Several cast iron pots wafted smoke in the background – promise of welcoming food being prepared. My heart threatened to beat out its socket: These people were really serious!

I gave greetings to them, and thanked all of them for their dedicated efforts. I recognized all those important people who were there. Then I told them of our entire vision, what we wanted to do in Lesotho, and they came unglued. They clapped, gave the happy cry and our hearts soared together, two diverse cultures meeting together with one common cause: to help the children of their villages who have no parents…

Ladell goes on to tell how moving the event was – he could think of no past experience in Africa that equals it: a true convergence of calling and destiny, the pleasure of God. In his words, it seemed as if God is saying that “we must do all within our power to continue putting this project on the map.”

Ladell’s passion comes through, powerfully, in his words:

I want the entire world to become involved. These kids need all we can give them, and as a side effect to it, thousands of lives will be touched and possibly a nation will be saved from annihilation. There were Christians, Jehovah Witnesses, Catholics, Lesotho Evangelical Church, and many other groups. They were all aware that we were Christian. They did not seem to care. Lives are being touched and changed and they seemed to want to be a part of it. The BANA Project is certainly a success. However, there is much, much more to do and their needs will never go away. We are going to be there for each child as they grow up and take their place in Basotho life. There is education, training, preparation, and many things to do for the children and we intend to be there.

You can read more here and here, but it is true: God is calling this project into existence, with the purpose of saving many lives, and perhaps a nation. Ladell and the others have come to the kingdom “for such a time as this!”

People are seeing the vision. Generous donors have heard the calling on the night wind, and moved to contribute. Lives are being touched and healed. The word is going out, with hope and healing in its wings!

And, there is room for your heart and action, should you sense the call!

The BANA project of Lesotho is making a difference in our time, our world of desperate need. Stay tuned here for more to come…

God bless,

Loy

See the sign of love appear

HYMN: God whose love is everywhere

Words: Timothy Dudley-Smith (c) Tune: Christingle Praise

God whose love is everywhere
made our earth and all things fair,
ever keeps them in His care:
praise the God of love!
He who hung the stars in space
holds the spinning world in place;
praise the God of love!

Come with thankful songs to sing
of the gifts the seasons bring,
summer, winter, autumn, spring;
praise the God of love!
He who gives us breath and birth
gives us all the fruitful earth;
praise the God of love!

Mark what love the Lord displayed,
all our sins upon Him laid,
by His blood our ransom paid;
praise the God of love!
Circled by that scarlet band
all the world is in His hand;
praise the God of love!

See the sign of love appear,
flame of glory, bright and clear,
light for all the world is here;
praise the God of love!
Gloom and darkness, get you gone!
Christ the Light of life has shone;
praise the God of love!