​It was not until God breathed the breath of life into the nostrils of Adam that he became a living being. (Genesis 2:7)  Acts 17:24-25 explains, "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands.  And He is not served by human hands, as if He needed anything, because He Himself gives all men life and breath and everything else." 
 
I have contemplated the importance of the breath of God as I sing the song, "Great Are You Lord" by James Ingram.  Think about these words:  "You give life.  You are love; You bring light to the darkness.  You give hope, You restore every heart that is broken.  And great are You Lord!  It's Your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise, we pour out our praise.  It's Your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise to You only."
 
Job has much to say about the breath of God.  "In His hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind." (Job 12:10)  "The Spirit of God has made me; the breath of the Almighty gives me life." (Job 33:4)  "If it were His intension and He withdrew His Spirit and breath, all humanity would perish together, and mankind would return to dust."  (Job 34:14-15)  Likewise, the Psalmist recognizes how the Word of the Lord and His breath created the world we live in.  "By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made, their starry host by the breath of His mouth." (Psalm 33:6)  "...Each man's life is but a breath.  Selah.” (Psalm 39:5)
 
We were made in God's image. (Genesis 1:26, 9:6)  His intent was and is that His children partner with Him in creating.  How do we do this?  We co-create by our breath, speaking life into the world around us.  God wants us to bring heaven to earth through our spoken words.  God also realizes that the enemy of our souls will do anything possible to stop our agreement with the Kingdom of Light.  So, we are in the middle of a ferocious battle to stop us from speaking or even breathing.  Covid 19 literally takes away our breath!
 
God explains His provision for us in the area of battling against the powers of darkness in Ephesians 6. There are five defensive weapons in our toolbelt:  the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel of peace, the helmet of salvation, and the shield of faith.  However, the Lord has given us two offensive weapons:  the sword of the Spirit and prayer in the Spirit.  Both weapons require us to use our breath and speak out truth.  Jesus demonstrated how to use the sword when the devil came after Him in the desert.  As Jesus spoke out the truth of the Word, the devil had to flee from Him.  In his book, Spiritual Warfare, Joseph Prince says, "It is not enough to just know God's Word in your heart.  You have to speak it out.  That is when latent power becomes actual power...God's Word in your mouth is like God speaking." (Page 83-84)  "When you declare the Scripture aloud, the Word of God fights for you. The devil has no defense against the Word of God." (Page 86)
 
We must not allow the enemy of our souls to keep us from declaring the truth and the praises of God Most High.  Remember that Jesus brought the breath of His Father to earth.  When He was getting ready to return to His Father in Heaven, He breathed on His disciples and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit." (John 20:21)  The breath of God is in us to bring about life.  Much territory has been stolen from us during this past year.  We have been equipped with weapons for warfare.  God wants us to use them so that we not only recover what has been stolen from us, but we also take plunder from the enemy camp.  Start taking plunder, dear ones.  That is our inheritance!

My message this week has been inspired by some life cycles.  I have been contemplating God's faithfulness and the evidence of His attention to our lives.  The Lord is gracious and compassionate, always drawing us closer so that we can see life through His eyes.  He uses everything we experience to strengthen our understanding of His amazing love for us and what it means to live in the Kingdom of Light.  He loves all of creation and has set times and seasons for each. (Ecclesiastes 3:1)  Changing  seasons are meant to give us unique encounters with different aspects of the Lord's character.
 
Three years of marriage to my wonderful husband, Jac, is worth celebrating and thanking the Lord for His goodness.  We decided to do so by taking a trip to Bushkill Falls in the Poconos.  One cannot travel this time of year without being in awe of God's creation.  Hillsides full of evergreens and deciduous trees bearing leaves of golden yellow, rust, red and brown are like painted pictures that take your breath away.  It was only seven months ago that the trees were beginning to push out their new leaves for the season.  Quickly the leaves matured so that they could fulfill their God-given purpose—to supply food for the plants through photosynthesis.  Having completed their job, the leaves give us a final gift by going out in a blaze of glory.  What a blessing it is to live through these cycles of life!
 
As my husband and I walked through the forest at Bushkill Falls, we were delighted by a native, multi-stemmed shrub that does things differently than most others.  The Common Witch Hazel is native to the moist soil of the PA woodlands and is growing in abundance at the side of the waterfalls.  They display their yellow, spider-like flowers in the fall along with their yellow leaves, looking quite beautiful next to the bold, green leaves of the native rhododendron. God surely does have beauty for every season. Listening to the sound of the waterfalls and seeing the clear water splashing down on the rocks reminded us of Psalm 42:7-8.  "Deep calls to deep in the roar of Your waterfalls; all Your waves and breakers have swept over me.  By day, the Lord directs His love, at night His song is with me--a prayer to the God of my life.”
 
We came home filled with awe and wonder at the magnificence of God and the precision by which He orders the seasons of the earth.  However, we were about to experience the completion of another life cycle.  Sixteen years ago, my daughter, Laura, told me about a skinny cat she saw who was eating out of her college dumpster. She begged me to allow her to bring the cat home for adoption.  Not wanting the responsibility of caring for an animal, I directly said "No!"  God had other plans.  That night He gave me a dream in which I was holding a gray cat with gold eyes.  I heard Him say, "I want you to adopt the cat." Waking up, I started a conversation with God that went like this:  "Why would you ask me to adopt a cat who I do not want?"  "Because, through this cat I will show you beauty for ashes.  I will take the ashes of your life and transform them into something beautiful."  I told Laura that I wanted to see the cat.  Of course, she was the cat that God showed me in my dreams.  We named her Cinder.  After taking her to the vet for de-worming and cleaning, she joined me at my condo and became my constant companion.  
 
I have no regrets. Cinder was faithful to greet me at the top of the stairs every time I came home.  In her early years, she would amuse me by doing "calisthenics" on the open staircase.  She loved to sleep next to me on the bed until my husband joined us.  Jac would joke with me and say, "Beauty has arrived.  It is time for ashes to go."  Cinder's season of life came to an end on Friday.  She had been losing weight and struggling with bad health.  I delayed the inevitable.  Thursday night God gave me another dream.  It was time for Cinder's life to end.  Even though the vet told us we were doing the best thing for Cinder, my heart broke.  I am grateful for the years I had with her.
 
Seasons come and go.  There is beauty and ashes.  And, as the writer of Ecclesiastes says, "He has made everything beautiful in its time." (V. 11)  An artist by the name of Josh Baldwin recently wrote a song that seems appropriate to repeat.  Here is part of it:   "All throughout my history, Your faithfulness has walked beside me.  The winter storms made way for spring in every season from where I'm standing. I see the evidence of Your goodness, all over my life, all over my life.  I see Your promises in fulfillment, all over my life, all over my life."  Let us remember that no matter what season we are living in, God is by our sides orchestrating events, changing times and seasons, and drawing us closer to Him.  What more could we ask for?

​America was preparing to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1876.  A 35-year old rector of a small Episcopal church in Brandon, Vermont, thought that the country should have a new national hymn for the occasion.  Daniel Crane Roberts introduced the song he wrote to his parishioners on July 4, 1876, and they sang it together at their Brandon village church.  Later, there was a National Centennial Observance to commemorate the adoption of the Constitution.  Roberts' song was selected as the official hymn for the event.  The words remind us of the rich heritage of our country and how God was a part of the foundations.  It is called "God of Our Fathers."
 
    God of our fathers, whose almighty hand leads forth in beauty all the starry band; of shining worlds in splendor thru the skies, our grateful songs before Thy throne arise.
 
    Thy love divine hath led us in the past, in this free land by Thee our lot is cast; be thou our ruler, guardian, guide and stay; thy word our law, Thy paths our chosen way.
 
    From war's alarms, from deadly pestilence, be Thy strong arm our ever-sure defense; Thy true religion in our hearts increase; Thy bounteous goodness nourish us in peace.
 
    Refresh Thy people on their toilsome way.  Lead us from night to never ending day; fill all our lives with love and grace divine, and glory, laud, and praise be ever Thine.
 
The words of this song are powerful!  Can you imagine the delight it gave God when it was first sung?  It includes praise, thanksgiving, confession of our need for Him, requests for His presence, and truth.  To me, it seems like the perfect song for us to sing today.  We have strayed from our country's foundation and are in desperate need of God's continued guidance, defense, and peace.  Without the Lord in charge, I believe our nation is doomed.
 
I found an interesting quote on the Internet from John Mathison of Leadership Ministries.  He says, "The first two colonies established in American made it clear that they were being established for 'the glory of God and the propagation of the Christian faith.'"  How far we have fallen from their intent!  How we need the breath of God to blow upon us and bring us back into His fold!
 
In Genesis 18:23-25 we read how Abraham spoke to God about saving Sodom on behalf of the righteous.  He asked, "Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?...Far be it for you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked..."  Abraham began to test God, asking Him if He found 50, then 45, then 30, then 20, and finally 10 righteous, would he still destroy Sodom.  Each time, the Lord would relent.  When Abraham asked about saving the city for only 10 people, here is how God responded:  "For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it." (Genesis 18:32)
 
How merciful is God that he would have saved all of Sodom for the sake of ten righteous people!  We need to join together in a chorus of repentance, humility, and worship to ask for God's mercy on the United States.  Perhaps He will have compassion on us and bring our nation back to its intended purpose. Psalm 33:12 says, "Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people He chose for His inheritance."  I believe that God chose our nation, along with Israel, to represent Him on the earth.  Join me in interceding for our country.  Surely, we have more than 10 righteous in our nation.  Let's bow before the God of our fathers to remind Him of our past and plead for our future.

​One of my favorite CDs is Paul Wilbur's "Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem."  It is not unusual for me to replay this CD repeatedly.  At the beginning of the week, I was doing this, and lines from various songs began to stand out to me.  I started to think that praying these lines would be powerful.  Each song contributes to a way that we can pour our hearts out to the Lord.  Pouring out our hearts is an important thing to do in this ever-changing season of loss, shock, trauma, and chaos.  Many weigh in with possible solutions to solve the problems of our beloved nation.  However, we should realize that man cannot legislate righteousness in humankind or change hard hearts; only God can do this!
 
The people of God frequently strayed from His ways.  God, acting as a good parent, disciplined them and then he would bring them back to Himself.  He said to Ezekiel, tell my people, "I had concern for my holy name, which the people of Israel profaned among the nations where they had gone...I will show the holiness of my great name...Then the nations will know that I am the Lord...I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols.  I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.  And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws."  (Ezekiel 36:21-27)
 
We see how God has the power to change a heart.  How we need Him to do this for the heart of our nation!  Without God we are helpless.  The bad reports coming from our media make me want to hide.  This thought is wonderfully expressed as Paul sings "In Your Presence Oh God" by Lynn Deshazo.  One of the verses says, "I want to hide where the flood of evil cannot reach me, where I'm covered by the blood.  I want to be where the schemes of darkness cannot touch me—In your presence oh God!"  We all need to be in the presence of God, especially in this season.  It is in these places of intimacy with the Lord where He gives us His heart for the nations and reveals how to pray.
 
Scripture is clear that we are called to pray for the peace of Jerusalem.  "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: 'May those who love you be secure.  May there be peace within your walls and security within your citadels.'  For the sake of my family and friends, I will say, 'Peace be within you.'  For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your prosperity." (Psalm 122:6-9)  The last verse of Paul's song, "Shalom Jerusalem" portrays God's desire to change the hearts of His people:  "Israel, beloved Ephraim my son, How my heart would thrill to hear you say The Messiah has come.  Oh, my brother, hear these words; may they pierce your soul.  Turn again to worship Adonai, Messiah you will know."  
 
The prophet Habakkuk understood that we must wait for the revelation of the Lord.  He promised to look to see what the Lord will say to him.  God gives a warning:  "Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by injustice." (Habakkuk 2:12)  Habakkuk cries out to God, "Lord, I have heard of Your fame; I stand in awe of Your deeds.  Lord, repeat them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy." (Habakkuk 3:2)  We need the truth of God's Kingdom to reign in us.  It is time for us to confess and repent for the sin of turning away from God's ways and for rebellion against Him.  It is time to invite the Lord to come and take His place on the throne of our hearts.
 
The song "Even So" was written by Steve Merkel.  As Paul sings, we need to join Him in the invitation to our Lord,  "You are welcome in this place; be enthroned upon our praises.  May our worship rise like incense as we magnify the Son.  Mighty God of Israel, Lamb upon the Throne, all blessing, and honor to our God forevermore.  We join our hearts together, we come in one accord; the bonds of peace unite us in the Spirit of the Lord...Let the Spirit and the Bride say come...To the Lion and the Lamb, Heaven's King, the Great I Am; Come take your place on Your throne.” Revelation 5:8 tells us that the 24 elders around the Throne of the Lord had harps and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.  Let us fill those bowls with our prayers of repentance and invitation to the Lord.  Let worship of our God arise!

After leaving Egypt, the children of Israel walked by the desert road to the Red Sea.  "By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light..." (Exodus 13:21) In the meantime, the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart so that he decided to pursue the Israelites.  There was great fear in the Israelite camp when the Egyptian armies arrived.  But the angel of the Lord, along with the pillar of cloud, stood between the Egyptians and the Israelites. During the night "Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land.  The waters were divided, and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left." (Exodus 14:21-22)
 
According to Chuck Pierce of Glory of Zion Ministries, the Israelites crossed the Red Sea on the eighth day after Passover.  Fascinating! Prophetically, the number eight stands for death and resurrection/ new beginnings and sanctification.  Remember how God required that every male baby boy be circumcised on the eighth day as part of His covenant? There was a cutting open of the foreskin as a sign of covenant. Doesn't opening the sea and separating it remind you that God was confirming the covenant that He made with Abraham over 400 years before?  When that covenant was made, Abraham brought the Lord a heifer, goat and ram and cut them in two so that the halves could be arranged opposite each other as a sign of "cutting a covenant." (Genesis 15:10-15)
 
God was always faithful to His covenant with His people.  As they walked through the Red Sea, it was as though they were dying a death to be resurrected on the other side.  They were headed toward the Promised Land and a new life where the Lord would provide everything they needed in the way of food, clothes, shelter, protection, and victory in battle.  However, they would learn that God provided for them in His way—one day at a time.  Every morning there was manna for the day.  The Israelites needed to learn how to trust the Lord.  We need to do the same thing.  Fear and uncertainty have arisen as we are in the middle of a pandemic.  Restrictions on the way we live are in place.  Yet, we must not let the news of the Coronavirus stop us from praising the Lord for His unfailing love and compassion.  Two Scriptures come to mind:  Proverbs 3:26 in The Passion Translation declares, "God is your confidence in times of crisis, keeping your heart at rest in every situation."  My "go to" verse in times of difficulty comes from Lamentations 3:22-23.  "Because of the Lord's great love, we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail, they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness."
 
Hymn writer Thomas Chisholm understood about the faithfulness of God.  He saw it in the day in and day out circumstances of his life.  He knew that God's presence was the premier sign of His faithfulness.  He is Emmanuel—God with us.  God showed Himself to the Israelites in different manifestations just as He does today.  The greatest manifestation of His faithfulness, however, was shown when the Son of God, Jesus, came to live on earth.  Thomas Chisholm was inspired to write a classic hymn that has been consistently sung from the time it was written.  Shortly before his death he explained the inspiration for his song, Great Is Thy Faithfulness:  "I must not fail to record here the unfailing faithfulness of a covenant-keeping God and that He has given me many wonderful displays of His providing care which have filled me with astonishing gratefulness.”
 
During this season, let us remember that we have a faithful, covenant-keeping God.  Singing the words of Chisholm's inspired hymn will help us walk through the Red Sea of our lives to get through to the other side: 

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father!  There is no shadow of turning with Thee; Thou changest not; Thy compassions, they fail not:  As Thou hast been Thou forever wilt be.
 
Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest, sun, moon, and stars in their courses above, join with all nature in manifold witness to Thy great faithfulness, mercy, and love.
 
Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth, thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide.  Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow—blessings all mine with ten thousand beside.
 
Chorus:  Great is Thy faithfulness!  Great is Thy faithfulness!  Morning by morning new mercies I see; all I have needed Thy hand hath provided. Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.
​

​It was during the month of Tammuz, the fourth month on the Hebrew calendar, that Moses sent the spies into the Promised Land to explore it.  He appointed one leader from each tribe to investigate the situation.  They were to check out how the people lived and the soil conditions and the kind of trees that grew in it.  If possible, they were to bring back some fruit.  Twelve men returned on the eve of the ninth of Av, the next month, with a mixed report.  All acknowledged that the land was flowing with milk and honey and that the fruit was huge.  However, ten of the twelve men insisted that the giants who lived in the land, descendants of Anak and part of the Nephilim described in Genesis 6:4, would be too much for them to overtake.  Even though Joshua and Caleb reminded the Israelites that God had promised to go before them and give them the land, fear overtook them, and they were unwilling to move forward into their destiny.
 
Since we are now in the month of Tammuz, it would benefit us to look at the story in Numbers 13 and 14.  It was the giants in the land and the belief of the ten spies that they could not overcome them that kept the children of Israel, with the exception of Joshua and Caleb, from receiving their inheritance.  God had promised His children that they would overcome the giants and take possession of the Land.  (“Then the Lord said to Moses…'Go up to the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, saying, I will give it to your descendants.’” - Exodus 33:1) They were on the threshold of victory but allowed fear and oppression to overtake them.
 
At a recent Global Awakening conference, Sean Smith, prophetic evangelist and Director of Point Blank International, spoke about this situation and suggested our present generation is in a battle with the spirit of Anak.  That spirit causes us to doubt and accept mediocrity.  It erodes our resolve to fight and keeps us from occupying our promises and producing fruit.  The spirit distorts our goals so that we do not want to take on a challenge and desire to return to "Egypt."  Anak piggybacks onto trauma and disappointment and causes us to become complacent, apathetic and passive.  In essence, that spirit puts a cap on us.  
 
Sean gave us some truths to remember in order to deal with Anak.  Bill Johnson, lead pastor at Bethel in California, inspired this one:  "When you come into agreement with the principles of the world, you come under the authority of the principality that released it."  Do not believe in the magnitude of the problem, but in the certainty of God's promise.  Sean says we must be aware of the spirit of Anak and develop a game plan to overcome it.  Why?  "You face your greatest obstacle when you are on the doorstep of your greatest miracle."
 
Let's be aware of this challenge and push ourselves to move forward instead of regressing into the territories we have already won!  We must make the month ahead of us a time to stand on the promises of God and a time to worship Him.  Evaluate your situations through the eyes of Christ.  I would like to suggest that Rita Springer's song "Defender" articulates a strategy for success in our battles to take the ground that God wants to give us.  Soak in her words and let them inspire us to have confidence in our God and every promise He has given to us:
 
"You go before I know that You've gone to win my war.  You come back with the head of my                  enemy; You come back and You call it my victory. (1st Verse)
You go before I know that You've gone to win my war.  Your love becomes my greatest defense; It leads me from the dry wilderness. (2nd Verse)
You know before I do where my heart can seek to find Your truth.  Your mercy is the shade I'm living in; You restore my faith and hope again. (3rd Verse)
All I did was praise; All I did was worship; All I did was bow down; All I did was stay still. Hallelujah, You have saved me; So much better Your way.  Hallelujah, Great Defender; So much better Your way."  
                (Chorus)
 
Hallelujah indeed!  Our Great Defender goes before us to prepare the way and give us the victory.  He is worthy of all praise and honor!

"When religion has said its last word, there is little that we need other than God Himself.  The evil habit of seeking God-and effectively prevents us from finding God in full revelation.  In the and lies our great woe.  If we omit the and we shall soon find God, and in Him we shall find that which we have all our lives been secretly longing."  So writes A. W. Tozer in his book, The Pursuit of God. 
 
God wired us to worship Him.  It is part of our DNA.  This unique characteristic that God placed inside of every person must be satisfied.  The desire to worship is so strong that we will do anything to fulfill it.  We will build an altar and bow at it, if not to God, to someone or something else.
 
Ecclesiastes 3:11 tells us this:  "...He has set eternity in the hearts of men..."  God is an Eternal God.  Worship is a condition of the heart.  Our hearts are on a quest to be satisfied through worship.  The truth is that worship that is not God-centered will never satisfy.  However, worship that is God-centered is sacrificial and requires that we yield ourselves to Him.  Here is how Romans 12:1 says it:  "...In view of God's mercy, offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—This is your spiritual act of worship."  Worship is a choice.  We get to choose the altar where we will bow.
 
The psalmist knows how to express the details of worship.  "Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise; He is to be feared above all gods.  For all the gods of the nations are idols, but the Lord made the heavens.  Splendor and majesty are before Him; strength and glory are in His sanctuary.  Ascribe (Offer a concrete expression of praise.) to the Lord, O families of nations, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. Ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name; bring an offering and come into His courts.  Worship the Lord in the splendor of His holiness; tremble before Him, all the earth." (Psalm 96:4-9)
 
Here is the good news:  The Lord draws closer and closer to us in response to our worship. (James 4:8) Worship is total surrender to God's will.  God's desire is for us to be immersed and saturated in His Presence.  He wants us lost in worship.  Lost means that we are hidden in Christ, ruin for anything else and cannot find our way back to life as it used to be.  As we abide in Him and express our love and awe for Him, we will begin to carry the evidence that we have been with God.
 
I want to leave you with the words of a worship song written by Israel Houghton--"I Live to Worship You."
 
       "Away, Away from the noise, alone with You.
        Away, Away to hear Your voice, and meet with You.
        Nothing else matters.  My one desire is...
 
        Chorus:    To worship You, I live.  To worship You, I live; I live to worship You.
                         To worship You, I live.  To worship You, I live; I live to worship You.
                         Oh, Oh, Oh, Ohhhhh.  Oh, Oh, Oh, Ohhhhh.  Oh, Oh, Oh, Ohhhhh.  Oh, Oh, Oh, Ohhhhh.
 
        Away, Away from the noise, alone with You.
        Away, Away to hear Your voice; It's been a while,
        But hear my heart cry again."    Chorus.
 
These are words that demonstrate a true heart of worship!

​The song "Reckless Love" by Steffany Gretzinger recounts some of the ways the Lord displays His love for us.  He sings over us, breathes life into us, fights for us, and paid it all for us.  The love of God is relentless!  The song declares, "There's no shadow You won't light up, mountain You won't climb up, coming after me.  There's no wall You won't kick down, no lie You won't tear down coming after me."  Indeed, God's love is reckless!  This word conveys the thought of a person who is so consumed with love that all concerns for their own welfare are set aside.  The dictionary defines reckless as careless, heedless, foolish, wild and rash.
 
When trying to describe God's love the chorus of the song says, "Oh the overwhelming, never ending, reckless love of God. Oh, it chases me down, fights 'till I'm found, leaves the ninety-nine.  I couldn't earn it, I don't deserve it.  Still, You give yourself away.  Oh, the overwhelming, never ending, reckless love of God."
 
Let's think about this word reckless.  The Lord loves us so much that He would leave 99 others just for you or me.  Both Matthew and Luke tell how Jesus taught this truth using sheep as an analogy.  After having explained to His disciples that they need to be humble like little children in order to be great in the kingdom of heaven, Jesus launches into a teaching on the love of God.  "See that you do not look down on one of these little ones.  For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.  What do you think?  If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off?  And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off.  In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost." (Matthew 18:12-14)  
 
Luke 15:5-7 repeats the words of Jesus on this subject with more insight regarding finding the lost sheep.  "And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulder and goes home.  Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.'  I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent."  
 
Those hearing the story of the shepherd who left 99 sheep to find one would understand that the head shepherd would leave the rest of his flock with his helpers so that they are not unattended.  However, it is significant that the head shepherd is the one who leaves to seek the lost sheep.  His priority is saving that one!  So too our Shepherd King, Jesus.  He left the throngs of heaven that worship Him day and night to come to earth to seek the lost.  "For the Son of Man came to seek and to save who was lost." (Luke 19:10)
 
Every single person on the face of the earth is important to our God.  As it says in 2 Peter 3:9, He is patient with us, "not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance."  He went to extraordinary measures to run after us.  Our King Jesus gave up everything and subjected himself to death on a cross so that we could have everlasting life and be in heaven with Him for eternity.  Oh the love of God!  It is incomprehensible!  His love is overwhelming, never ending and reckless!
 

On July 4th I had the privilege of going to the Johnson Ferry House at Washington Crossing State Park in New Jersey.  The curator of that house planned special events in honor of our country's Independence Day.  Outside of the Ferry House, raspberry ice cream was being made the way it would have been made in colonial days.  As we stood outside, the sound of patriotic melodies with beautiful harmonies came wafting towards us and drew us inside.  Several musicians and singers dressed in period costumes greeted us.  We were invited to join them in song. 


Singing all of the verses of the patriotic hymns moved me emotionally as I contemplated the words that describe the founding of the United States of America. Each song that we sang recognized that God is the one who has blessed us and confirmed that our forefathers truly established our nation on a godly foundation.  Most of us would be familiar with the first verse of the songs we sang but not the subsequent ones.  I want to record the powerful words of some of the lesser known verses of three of these songs.

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America the Beautiful by Katharine Lee Bates (1859 - 1929)
Katharine Bates wrote about the message of her hymn:  "We must match the greatness of our country with the goodness of personal godly living.  If only we could couple the daring of the Pilgrims with the moral teachings of Moses, we would have something in this country that no one could ever take from us."  I am particularly fond of the third verse of her hymn:  
"O beautiful for heroes proved in liberating strife, who more than self their country loved and mercy more than life! America! America! May God thy gold refine, till all success be nobleness, and every gain divine."

Battle Hymn of the Republic by Julia Ward Howe (1819 - 1910)
Julia Howe wrote this hymn in the midst of the Civil War.  It inspired the entire nation when it went public.  The third and fourth verses speak of God's plans and the birth of Christ as our Savior: 

"He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat.  He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat.  O be swift, my soul, to answer Him; be jubilant, my feet!  Our God is marching on."  Refrain:  "Glory! Glory! Hallelujah" (3 times) "His truth is marching on."

"In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, with a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me.  As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free!  While God is marching on.” Refrain: (See above.)

The Star Spangled Banner by Frances Scott Key (1779 - 1843)
It was during the War of 1812, while on the deck of a ship, that Frances Scott Key wrote what was to become our national anthem in 1931.  Rarely do we sing the second verse, but I believe it is noteworthy:
 
"O thus be it ever, when free men shall stand between their loved homes and the war's desolation! Blest with victory and peace, may the heaven-rescued land praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!  Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just; and this be our motto: 'In God is our trust!' And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!"
 
Psalm 33:12 says, "Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people He chose for His inheritance."  The authors of the above hymns understood this. We must add the Amen!k here to edit.