They that multiply gods multiply griefs to themselves; for whosoever thinks one god too little, will find two too many, and yet hundreds not enough. - Matthew Henry

The LORD will provide

...and get thee into the land of Moriah, and there offer him up for a burnt offering on one of the mountains which I will tell thee of...[Abraham] went to the place that God had told him of...On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar...And they came to the place of which God had told him. - Gen 22:2-4, 9

And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-jireh; as it is said at the present day, On the mount of Jehovah will be provided. - Gen 22:14

The mount on which the Lord provided was the very place that the Lord directed Abraham to, right from the start. Abraham experienced God's providence as he obeyed and found himself at the right place, the place that the Lord led Him to be in. Do I sometimes wonder why I don't experience the Lord's providence in my life? Then I must ask, am I in the right place? Have I obeyed the Lord's directions? Or have I gone astray with eyes looking down and losing sight of that place, that Jehovah-jireh place?

Quotes from my reading

Christianity...does not teach us by dry rules and regulations, but by setting before us, in the Person of Christ, a perfect model of what we ought to be. It presents to our view the very One who, as a test, left us without a single plea, and as a victim, left us without a single stain, and who now, as our model, is to be the subject of our admiring study and the standard at which we are ever and only to aim. - C. H. Mackintosh

We see Christ's life only to be judged by it's perfection, we accept His death to be saved through it's efficacy and then understand His life now to live by it's example.

Remedy for retreat

The wall built, stone by stone, strong,
To shut one in from what seems wrong;
Serves only to keep others at bay,
Even to chasing dear ones away.

Those who passed by, peering in, concerned,
And though for them one’s heart truly yearned;
Shut out by each stone of cynicism,
Overwhelmed by arrows of sarcasm.

Now, all lonely, a peek outside taken,
Only to be filled with more fear, shaken;
Locked within, long, from the external shore,
Now makes it stranger than ever before.

Oh! For courage to step out again,
Knowing the labour shall not be in vain;
To live is Christ, to die is gain,
‘Tis God’s strange design to overcome pain.

His and Mine

My joy, a falling star,
For one brief moment bright;
But God's, the changeless firmament
That holds a changeless light.

My love, the ebb and flow
Of ocean's restless tides;
But His the towering cliff above
That evermore abides.

My trust, the spider's web,
As gossamer, as frail;
His word, the everlasting hills,
Whose strength can never fail.

My peace, a shallow pool,
Soon brimmed and sooner dried;
But God's, an ever-flowing stream
With waters deep and wide.

O rock! O steadfast hills!
Far sky, and river free!
Thy strength, Thy sure serenity,
Thy quietness, give me.

Annie Johnson Flint