I Wake Again, Because the Lord Sustains Me

"I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the LORD sustains me."

~Psalm 3:5

"The Sovereign LORD has given me an instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary. He wakens me morning by morning, wakens my ear to listen like one being taught."

~Isaiah 50:4
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Today, I don't know what I am going to do. But I know more clearly what is true than I have known it for a great while.

I know that I am God's. I know that He is mine. I may lay a claim to Him as my God, my Rock, my Shield, my Comfort, my Abba, my Hope, my Refuge. I know what I promised Him. I know what I feel. I know what I have chosen. I know that He is God, and He is good. I know that He loves me with an everlasting, unfailing love. I know that nothing can separate me from the love of Jesus. I know that I am more than a conqueror through Him.

I'm thinking about a lot of things this morning. I hope that maybe I could sing at the graduation for the class I came to PHC with. I'm thinking about trying to find a mission board to work for here in the States. I'm wondering if there is ANY possible way for me to get into recording, singing, traveling. I'm thanking God for Free Indeed, and acknowledging His work in it. I'm hoping that the Lyme's treatment won't be so bad as I think it's going to be. I think I want to go back to school for music. I want to see the ocean. I want to travel to New England. I want to make things right with my family, be reconciled to my best friend. I want to keep my vow to the Lord.

Mostly, I just want to know God's presence. I'm kinda Homesick today. When the one Person who holds me up is not someone I can touch or feel or see, it gets really hard to want to stay where I can't touch or feel or see Him.

Someone I know recently said that he was just waiting for God to dish him out some more pain. I guess I've taken that perspective for a while. But when the pain comes, as I knew it would, He is there, carrying me, just holding me safe. He's not just giving me lessons from this. He's changing me through His love. I can't believe that He has given me a love that would put ME out of the way for the people that I love, even when my own heart must break to do it. It's what I prayed for, and He has been so faithful!

He's giving me the desires of my heart.

I am tired--I have been tired for far too long, it would seem. Yet this morning, after the pain of the last several months, and more than I thought I could ever face, I find myself strangely refreshed, at peace, and safe, with a quiet joy that goes beyond the tears. God is having His way in me--in everything He does, He is faithful.I may not always like the way He works, but He is God, and His ways are perfect, and so totally different from mine.

I slept last night, and woke rested this morning. But more than just the physical awakening, God has used this to quicken me to life again. He is all I have, truly, deeply--more than I could ever be or give or want. My heart is alive again, awake. My hope, unseen though it is, is real, and it's solid and strong.

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"There Is A Budding Morrow in Midnight"

Wintry boughs against a wintry sky;
Yet the sky is partly blue
And the clouds are partly bright: —
Who can tell but sap is mounting high
Out of sight,
Ready to burst through?

Winter is the mother-nurse of Spring,
Lovely for her daughter's sake,
Not unlovely for her own :
For a future buds in everything;
Grown, or blown,
Or about to break.

~Christina Rossetti