5/15/22 Through 5/21/22

 5/15/22 Through 5/21/22

Sunday

To love and sacrifice is life

Yet selfish greed and lust are rife.

The choice to love is mine alone,

To add to sin, or sin atone.

The choice to love can touch the heart

And many graces there impart.

Indifference only feeds the crime

Preventing any upward climb.

But love will stop the spiral down

And truth will form the Savior's crown.

The many thorns, our sins confessed,

By lash, and lance, and nails, we're blessed.

Monday

The Spirit comes revealing love

The precious Son of God above.

A love that cures the blind and lame

And calls on men to do the same.

Some in ways profound and clear

Some with words dispelling fear.

But all should see some subtle way

The Spirit acts in every day.

Gratitude is oft the key

That helps the simple eye to see.

We go about our everyday

And fail to see the gifts conveyed.

But if we look with grateful hearts

We see the blessings Love imparts.

So every good, or every ill

Is drawing to the Father's will.

A will for love to dominate

And all our actions animate,

That learning here to love on earth,

Prepared we'll be for second birth.

Tuesday

Gather round and raise the dead.

Let prayers of praise and thanks be said.

Claim a healing, claim the kind

That changes heart and changes mind.

An intercessor all men need 

To stand before the Lord and plead

The blood of Jesus cleanse our sin

And welcome contrite sinner in.

No life on earth is want to end

Before, with God, it fail to mend

The rift that all our sin has made,

And plead the Blood, our debt has paid.

Wednesday

(Can be sung to the tune of "Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent")

Vine supplies the living water

Grafted firmly on the root

There alone the branch can flourish

There it bears abundant fruit.

Prune it well.  Prepare the branches

All they need in this pursuit.

Only in the Vine can branches

Bear desired fruit for He.

Parted they will only whither

All will dry and lifeless be

Fuel for everlasting fire

Those that separate from Thee.

Thursday

The poorest of the poor destroy

Their only chance of finding joy.

They grow to hate His holy will,

And so, their chance at joy they kill.

Commands, He gives to shine a light,

To show the way, dispelling night.

Though selfishness, our vision blurred,

Reality is in His Word.

Obedience, the lower law

So early on Apostles saw

And then they chose one high above,

Divine, self-giving, law of love.

The Spirit gives that higher law

As well to Gentiles, as they saw.

So joy is in the common reach,

And love will span the widest breach.

If only I would plainly see

How daily He is calling me,

And all His offered grace employ,

I'd find my daily dose of joy.

Friday

The challenge is to love another

Not just sister, friend, or brother.

But the one that does you harm,

And so the hateful one disarm.

Saturday

One who loved, the world hated,

He that all the world created.

He who only Truth had spoken

Kept His promises unbroken.

He endured the cross and grave

But three days hence arose to save

The ones that wielded lash and thorn

With nail and lance, His flesh had torn.

How, such love, can man refuse,

Or evil and the good confuse?

In love alone is joy complete.

The Grain we crushed, our Finest Wheat.