Today in church we sang one of my all time favourite hymns: How Great Thou Art. I know a lot of people like the newer songs, but I love the older hymns.
Here are the lyrics to How Great Thou Art:
O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made;
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art!
When through the woods, and forest glades I wander,
And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees.
When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur
And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art,
How great Thou art!
And when I think, that God, His Son not sparing;
Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in;
That on the Cross, my burden gladly bearing,
He bled and died to take away my sin.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art!
When Christ shall come, with shout of acclamation,
And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart.
Then I shall bow, in humble adoration,
And then proclaim: "My God, how great Thou art!"
The speaker today spoke about how our resolution for the year 2007 should be to glorify God in all we do. Let’s carry that message with us in to the new year, and remember how great He really is!
I’ve way over-scheduled myself over the Christmas break, and I’ve just been running all over the place, but luckily tomorrow is completely free for me, so I’ll have to sit down and write about what I’ve been up to!
Love In Him-
*L
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
The REAL meaning of Christmas
I hope everyone had a great Christmas! Mine definitely was. My family arrived around 1 o'clock, and stayed until around 11 ,and I don't think the conversation stopped the entire time!
My grandmother gave me a Christmas card with this on the front:
C- Counsellor
H- Healer
R- Redeemer
I- Immanuel
S- Shepherd
T- Truth
M- Messiah
A- Almighty
S- Saviour
I'm saving the card to bookmark the Christmas story in one of my old Bibles.
I'm off to make cookies for the barn Christmas party tomorrow evening, but if I don't burn the house down (haha) and I have time later tonight, I'll write up another post.
If not- may you all remember the real reason we are celebrating this holiday!
Lots of holiday love...
In His Name-
*L
My grandmother gave me a Christmas card with this on the front:
C- Counsellor
H- Healer
R- Redeemer
I- Immanuel
S- Shepherd
T- Truth
M- Messiah
A- Almighty
S- Saviour
I'm saving the card to bookmark the Christmas story in one of my old Bibles.
I'm off to make cookies for the barn Christmas party tomorrow evening, but if I don't burn the house down (haha) and I have time later tonight, I'll write up another post.
If not- may you all remember the real reason we are celebrating this holiday!
Lots of holiday love...
In His Name-
*L
Sunday, December 24, 2006
What happened to Christmas spirit?
I’m back in Ottawa for Christmas, and it has been a crazy past two days! Christmas dinner is being held at our house this year, so my parents have been frantically preparing food and cleaning the house. My attempt to help my mom cook just ended with me being in the way, so I ended up running errands.
There’s no a speck of snow in sight, so it looks like it’s going to be a green Christmas. I heard on the news that the lack of snow is causing a decrease in the Christmas cheer people feel, and donations to charities are down. I definitely experienced that today. While running errands, at two different stores people completely cut me off in line. One woman actually cut right in front of me as I was about to put my purchases on the counter. I couldn’t believe it! Usually in Kanata we’re pretty friendly, but people would crash right in to me and not even say anything. Then, when I was in the parking lot, a man driving an SUV backed out of a spot, hit the car parked behind him and just took off! Didn’t even stop to see if the car he hit was ok, and there was a significant CRUNCH when he hit. There was a couple getting into their van close to my spot, and I overheard the wife say “can you believe that guy?” and the husband say “I know, so much for Christmas spirit”. I just couldn’t wait for all the madness to be over!
Of course, it was just as crazy at home. There wasn’t anything left for me to do, so to get out of the way I went hiking for a few hours on some trails close to my house. People were out walking their dogs and taking kids for a hike, and every single person I passed on the trail greeted me with a “Merry Christmas!”. So, maybe the Christmas spirit is still alive!
“And she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn”.
- Luke 2: 7
~Merry Christmas~
Celebrating His birth-
*L
There’s no a speck of snow in sight, so it looks like it’s going to be a green Christmas. I heard on the news that the lack of snow is causing a decrease in the Christmas cheer people feel, and donations to charities are down. I definitely experienced that today. While running errands, at two different stores people completely cut me off in line. One woman actually cut right in front of me as I was about to put my purchases on the counter. I couldn’t believe it! Usually in Kanata we’re pretty friendly, but people would crash right in to me and not even say anything. Then, when I was in the parking lot, a man driving an SUV backed out of a spot, hit the car parked behind him and just took off! Didn’t even stop to see if the car he hit was ok, and there was a significant CRUNCH when he hit. There was a couple getting into their van close to my spot, and I overheard the wife say “can you believe that guy?” and the husband say “I know, so much for Christmas spirit”. I just couldn’t wait for all the madness to be over!
Of course, it was just as crazy at home. There wasn’t anything left for me to do, so to get out of the way I went hiking for a few hours on some trails close to my house. People were out walking their dogs and taking kids for a hike, and every single person I passed on the trail greeted me with a “Merry Christmas!”. So, maybe the Christmas spirit is still alive!
“And she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn”.
- Luke 2: 7
~Merry Christmas~
Celebrating His birth-
*L
Friday, December 22, 2006
Two Envelopes
I love to get mail. Well, not all mail- the bills I can live without. Thursday morning when I went to check my mail, I found two envelopes. One contained a cheque from a bursary I had applied for a long time ago (sometime in the summer I think) that I had completely forgotten about. It wasn’t a lot of money, but it will definitely help replace the dent in my account from all the application expenses. I’ve been praying a lot of my finances, and the Lord answered my prayers!
The second enveloped contained my invitation the annual Christmas party that all of the “barn girls” have every year. I’ve grown up with these girls; I’ve known most of them since I was six years old. There are about twenty of us (yes, twenty!), and we all hung out at the barn as kids, and now that we’re older, most of us work there as a part time job. With university, marriage and jobs, a lot of us have left, but we all still stay in touch. We usually get together in smaller groups, because it’s so hard to always organize get-togethers when there’s so many of us. However, every Christmas for as long as I can remember, we’ve all gotten together. It’s the one time every year that we’re all at the same place at the same time (except for horse shows or sometimes on week-ends at the barn), and it’s always one of my favourite things to do at Christmas. I’m so excited; I’ve missed all those girls so much! Someone will always pull out pictures from our younger days (always good for a laugh or two!), plus there’s nothing better than being surrounded by your best friends, especially at Christmas time.
God is great!
~Merry Christmas~
In His Love;
*L
The second enveloped contained my invitation the annual Christmas party that all of the “barn girls” have every year. I’ve grown up with these girls; I’ve known most of them since I was six years old. There are about twenty of us (yes, twenty!), and we all hung out at the barn as kids, and now that we’re older, most of us work there as a part time job. With university, marriage and jobs, a lot of us have left, but we all still stay in touch. We usually get together in smaller groups, because it’s so hard to always organize get-togethers when there’s so many of us. However, every Christmas for as long as I can remember, we’ve all gotten together. It’s the one time every year that we’re all at the same place at the same time (except for horse shows or sometimes on week-ends at the barn), and it’s always one of my favourite things to do at Christmas. I’m so excited; I’ve missed all those girls so much! Someone will always pull out pictures from our younger days (always good for a laugh or two!), plus there’s nothing better than being surrounded by your best friends, especially at Christmas time.
God is great!
~Merry Christmas~
In His Love;
*L
Monday, December 18, 2006
One more week!!
I can’t believe how quickly December is flying by! I was shocked (and slightly embarrassed!) when I checked my last post and realized it was almost a week ago.
My exam last Wednesday went really well. It was the exam I was the most worried about, so it was a major relief to have it done. Since I had such a long break between exams, I studied all day Thursday and Friday, and took some time off this past week-end to hang out with my friend Jaimie. We used to swim together and lived together in residence in first year, but we really haven’t hung out a lot lately.
In our first year, the big trend (and our unofficial floor theme) was to collect lists. We had all kinds of lists: “what they never told you about university”, “you know you’re a student when…”, “signs you’re Canadian”, “you know you were born in the 80’s when…” and so on. Jaimie collected them all at the end of the year, and we were going over them and choosing all the ones that applied to us. It was so funny how our lives can be made in to lists that apply to so many other people.
If someone made a list “Signs you’re a Christian”, I wonder how many I’d be able to tick off. What qualities would be on the list? If someone else were to look at the list and think of you, what qualities would they chose for you? Just something to think about in the upcoming week.
Hope everyone has finished their Christmas shopping. I haven’t, and I’m already dreading hitting the mall to finish it up. Can you believe we celebrate the birth of our Lord in one week!?!
Jesus answered, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”.
- John 14:6
~Merry Christmas~
*L
My exam last Wednesday went really well. It was the exam I was the most worried about, so it was a major relief to have it done. Since I had such a long break between exams, I studied all day Thursday and Friday, and took some time off this past week-end to hang out with my friend Jaimie. We used to swim together and lived together in residence in first year, but we really haven’t hung out a lot lately.
In our first year, the big trend (and our unofficial floor theme) was to collect lists. We had all kinds of lists: “what they never told you about university”, “you know you’re a student when…”, “signs you’re Canadian”, “you know you were born in the 80’s when…” and so on. Jaimie collected them all at the end of the year, and we were going over them and choosing all the ones that applied to us. It was so funny how our lives can be made in to lists that apply to so many other people.
If someone made a list “Signs you’re a Christian”, I wonder how many I’d be able to tick off. What qualities would be on the list? If someone else were to look at the list and think of you, what qualities would they chose for you? Just something to think about in the upcoming week.
Hope everyone has finished their Christmas shopping. I haven’t, and I’m already dreading hitting the mall to finish it up. Can you believe we celebrate the birth of our Lord in one week!?!
Jesus answered, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”.
- John 14:6
~Merry Christmas~
*L
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Exam Fever
Usually the vibe at the library is very amicable, but all sense of decency goes out the window December 1, when the dreaded “Exam Fever” hits. The popular saying “all’s fair in love and war” should be altered to say “all’s fair in love, war and exams”. You snooze, you lose- the best tables, books and computers are taken at early hours that most university students haven’t been awake for since high school. Luckily for me, having my own apartment means I always have a quiet place to study during exams, so I haven’t had to endure the madness since I lived on campus in first year. Unfortunately, I needed to look up some research papers not available in the online catalogue, so I had to brave the madness this morning. Just as I nabbed the one last reference computer, some guy walked in who apparently was there for the same reason I was. Out of all the people using the reference computers, he chose me to hover behind. I can’t stand people who hover and constantly read over your shoulder- it drives me up the wall! It actually makes it harder for me to work because I keep focusing on how annoying it is someone is reading over my shoulder that I can’t focus on my work. Poor guy, his tactics were backfiring!
On the walk back home, I was still steaming over “Hovering Boy” when I realized that sometimes someone always looking over your shoulder isn’t a bad thing. God is always looking over us, keeping us safe and in His loving arms. Now THAT is something that doesn’t annoy me!
So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
- Isaiah 41:10
I have an exam tomorrow afternoon, so keep me in your prayers!
In His Loving Arms-
*L
On the walk back home, I was still steaming over “Hovering Boy” when I realized that sometimes someone always looking over your shoulder isn’t a bad thing. God is always looking over us, keeping us safe and in His loving arms. Now THAT is something that doesn’t annoy me!
So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
- Isaiah 41:10
I have an exam tomorrow afternoon, so keep me in your prayers!
In His Loving Arms-
*L
Saturday, December 09, 2006
A Season of Loss, A Lifetime of Forgiveness
A few weeks ago I went shopping at a second hand bookstore and came home with quite the loot. Showing an uncharacteristic restraint, I managed to ignore the stack while I was studying, but today (and by today I mean Friday, because I’m posting after midnight!) I took the afternoon off from reading textbooks and decided to read for fun. A while ago I heard about a book called “A Season of Loss, A Lifetime of Forgiveness”, and I've been wanting to read it ever since, so I was excited when I found a copy at the store. It was such a great book- it tells the story of late NHL-er Dan Snyder and how his family was able to come to terms with his death.
The book really made me think about the power of forgiveness. I think that forgiving someone for something that they’ve done is a really hard thing to do. Looking back at the bad things people have done to me, I’m not too bad with the forgiveness part, but I’m bad at the forgetting part. I can only truly “forgive and forget” with my very close friends.
There’s a comedy movie that my friends and I love to watch, and one of the main characters is a rock star who has no talent what so ever. She writes a song about forgiveness, and the main chorus line is “Forgiveness- it’s more than saying sorry”. Truly forgiving someone is more than just saying “it’s OK”. I’ll be praying that I’ll be able to show people forgiveness. It amazes me that the Lord will always forgive me. We are so lucky that the Lord forgives us, time and time again.
I just looked at the clock and I didn’t realize that it was so late, so I’m going to cut this short!
“For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you”.
- Matthew 6:14
“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you”.
- Ephesians 4:32
In His Love;
*L
The book really made me think about the power of forgiveness. I think that forgiving someone for something that they’ve done is a really hard thing to do. Looking back at the bad things people have done to me, I’m not too bad with the forgiveness part, but I’m bad at the forgetting part. I can only truly “forgive and forget” with my very close friends.
There’s a comedy movie that my friends and I love to watch, and one of the main characters is a rock star who has no talent what so ever. She writes a song about forgiveness, and the main chorus line is “Forgiveness- it’s more than saying sorry”. Truly forgiving someone is more than just saying “it’s OK”. I’ll be praying that I’ll be able to show people forgiveness. It amazes me that the Lord will always forgive me. We are so lucky that the Lord forgives us, time and time again.
I just looked at the clock and I didn’t realize that it was so late, so I’m going to cut this short!
“For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you”.
- Matthew 6:14
“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you”.
- Ephesians 4:32
In His Love;
*L
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Making the Time
This afternoon I was studying at the kitchen table and Jack decided he needed attention. He weaved in and out of the table legs meowing, but I just ignored him and kept working. Finally, he got sick of begging, and went for a much more obvious approach: he jumped up on the table, knocked the pen out of my hand and plunked himself down on my notes. He looked so cute and I haven’t had the time to play with him lately, so I took a break and we played with his toys for a while. That reminded me again of how easy it is to forget about the important things and how easy it is to over-schedule. Sure, playing with my cat versus studying for an exam is a no-brainer. There’s another kind of studying that I sometimes don’t make time for- my Bible. It seems that every time I start cutting down the time I spend on my devotions and readings, the Lord always manages to send a gentle reminder.
I finished studying the chapter I was on and then grabbed my Bible. Jack cuddled up with me and we made the time to study my Bible. It was such a nice break; I hardly spent any time studying my Bible yesterday, and I missed it. The day felt weird without it.
So, how do you make time for the Lord? I guess I have to thank Jack for the subtle reminder that I’ve been neglecting some things lately! Although I have a feeling the Lord might have been behind that one.
As for my presentation last Friday: it went remarkably well. My voice came back somewhat, but luckily the room was big enough that we needed to a microphone, so that helped. I usually don’t get nervous doing public speaking, but I was shaking when the person before me was talking. I just closed my eyes and prayed like crazy, and I really felt like the Lord was giving me strength as I spoke. (And I had even more luck, because I managed to escape relatively unscathed when I had to defend my research with questions from peers and the board of professors!).
I can all things through Christ who strengthens me
– Phillipians 4:13
In Him-
*L
I finished studying the chapter I was on and then grabbed my Bible. Jack cuddled up with me and we made the time to study my Bible. It was such a nice break; I hardly spent any time studying my Bible yesterday, and I missed it. The day felt weird without it.
So, how do you make time for the Lord? I guess I have to thank Jack for the subtle reminder that I’ve been neglecting some things lately! Although I have a feeling the Lord might have been behind that one.
As for my presentation last Friday: it went remarkably well. My voice came back somewhat, but luckily the room was big enough that we needed to a microphone, so that helped. I usually don’t get nervous doing public speaking, but I was shaking when the person before me was talking. I just closed my eyes and prayed like crazy, and I really felt like the Lord was giving me strength as I spoke. (And I had even more luck, because I managed to escape relatively unscathed when I had to defend my research with questions from peers and the board of professors!).
I can all things through Christ who strengthens me
– Phillipians 4:13
In Him-
*L
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