I ACTUALLY started this blog in 2009 as weekly emails titled “Morning Greetings” sent to a group under my assigned care as an elder in our church. The emails were meant to be a way to stay in touch in addition to other means of weekly fellowship and contact.
LAUNCHING this blog, it was my intension to go back and revisit, revise, and republish many of those emails, along with interspersing new thoughts as they occur along the way. As such, below is an excerpt from my very first Morning Greeting sent March 6th, 2009.
I Had recently discovered and been enjoying a little devotional book titled Bent Knee Time. I don’t even remember now where I got it. On that March 6th, it was just exactly one month after my youngest son Jon had his first heart attack and subsequent open-heart surgery on Feb. 17th. For those of you unfamiliar with that event, he was only 36 years old at the time, and has gone through a second open-heart surgery since, occurring in 2012, to fix problems stemming from the first operation.
I REPORTED in that first Morning Greeting that it was unbelievable that he (Jon) was “returning to work next Monday! Saying:
How amazing. Thank you so much for all your prayers. This was definitely one of the most difficult things I ever personally endured. Your Christian friendship and many prayers meant so much to me and the family.”
THE whole thing was a shocker. One thing I can recall as if it were today — was rising before dawn getting ready to go the hospital for the pending surgery. On my knees, beside the couch (which is where I slept that night), with open Bible, I tried to pray; but neither mind nor mouth would move. As I knelt there for I know not how long, I wondered why I could find no animation to what was so familiar to me in my daily habit. Then it occurred to me that all the promises and all the previous prayers had been stored up to make me ready me for such a time as this. It was time to get up and get on with it! …When I went to hospital to see my son before his final preparation, looking at him we both knew what it meant to have firmly fixed that quiet confidence that is your strength (Isa 30:15).
With that, here’s that March 6th consideration from Bent Knee Time
Phil. 4: 4-7, 9 – HEART SOVEREIGNTY.
God’s peace “passeth understanding,” but it does not pass appreciation. It’s too deep for our brains, but not for our hearts. It can’t be analyzed and explained, but it can be accepted, and yielded to, and enjoyed.
You don’t get it; it gets you. It does sentinel duty over your thoughts and imaginations, keeping worry out and trust and obedience in. Paul’s threefold rule of peace is simple: Worry about nothing; pray about everything; be thankful for all things. – Bent Knee, S.D.Gordon
In the wondrous blessings of Christ,
Joe
Neh. 8:10, Isa 30:15 & Job 2:10
“Worry about nothing; pray about everything; be thankful for all things.” Phil. 4:6
