Hidden Garden

Song of Solomon 4:9-15 – “You have captivated my heart, my sister, my bride; you have captivated my heart with one glance of your eyes,
with one jewel of your necklace. How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride! How much better is your love than wine, and the fragrance of your oils than any spice! Your lips drip nectar, my bride; honey and milk are under your tongue; the fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon. A garden locked is my sister, my bride, a spring locked, a fountain sealed. Your shoots are an orchard of pomegranates with all choicest fruits, henna with nard, nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense, myrrh and aloes, with all choice spices— a garden fountain, a well of living water, and flowing streams from Lebanon.

Songs of Snow and Clouds

Psalm 148: 7-14- ” Praise the LORD from the earth, Sea monsters and all deeps; Fire and hail, snow and clouds; Stormy wind, fulfilling His word; Mountains and all hills; Fruit trees and all cedars; Beasts and all cattle; Creeping things and winged fowl; Kings of the earth and all peoples; Princes and all judges of the earth; Both young men and virgins; Old men and children. Let them praise the name of the LORD, For His name alone is exalted; His glory is above earth and heaven. And He has lifted up a horn for His people, Praise for all His godly ones; Even for the sons of Israel, a people near to Him. Praise the LORD!

Dust to Dust

Genesis 3:17- 19 ” And to Adam he said,”Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Hosannah

Matthew 21:1-11 “As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her. Untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, tell him that the Lord needs them, and he will send them right away.” This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet: “Say to the Daughter of Zion, ‘See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.'” The disciples went and did as Jesus had instructed them. They brought the donkey and the colt, placed their cloaks on them, and Jesus sat on them. A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna in the highest!” When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and asked, “Who is this?” The crowds answered, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.”

Joshua

JOSHUA 10: 12-14- “At that time Joshua spoke to the Lord in the day when the Lord gave the Amorites over to the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel,

“Sun, stand still at Gibeon,
and moon, in the Valley of Aijalon.”
And the sun stood still, and the moon stopped,
until the nation took vengeance on their enemies.

Is this not written in the Book of Jashar? The sun stopped in the midst of heaven and did not hurry to set for about a whole day.  There has been no day like it before or since, when the Lord obeyed the voice of a man, for the Lord fought for Israel.”

Just recently, my husband sat reading this amazing story to my children.   Christiananswers.net   summarizes it this way.   “In Joshua 10, the Bible tells the story of the day when the sun–and time–stopped. The Israelites were fighting the Amorites in Canaan. During the battle, Joshua prayed for the sun and moon to stop, so he would have extra daylight to finish the task. Scripture records that this prayer was answered: The sun “delayed going down about a full day” (v. 13). The very objects in the sky that the Amorites worshipped fought against them!”

As I read the story, I could envision this brave warrior asking for the sun and moon to stop, and the colors of this colorway were born. Christian answers goes on to say,

“Several modern interpretations of the story have been suggested:

• Some say there was no actual miracle, but only the use of poetic language. The Israelites had fought so hard that it just seemed like two days of work in a row!
• Others propose that a cloud shaded the sun, keeping the day cool enough for the fighting to continue all through the afternoon. However, this relief from the heat would have benefited the enemy as much as Israel.
• Similarly, a solar eclipse has been suggested as causing reduced sunlight. But eclipses of the sun last for only a few minutes, not a whole day.

All of these explanations fall far short of the statement that there has never been another day like the one described (Joshua 10:14, cf. Habbakuk 3:11 – “…Sun and moon stood still in the heavens…”).

What really happened on that special day? As with all miracles, it is futile to speculate with scientific theories. The details are unclear, but we know that God could have refracted the light, or slowed the earth’s rotation, or stopped the entire universe–all with equal ease!

Time stopped for Joshua, and it ran backwards for Hezekiah (2 Kings 20:9-11).

God used this event as a special sign to show Hezekiah that he would regain his health. The sun’s shadow moved backwards by ten steps, probably five to six hours on the sundial. That is, the sun appeared to move eastward instead of westward. The conclusion is again the same, that such a miracle is beyond scientific explanation.

God may have temporarily reversed the earth’s rotation, including all its inhabitants, or the miracle in Hezekiah’s day could have been local instead of worldwide. The latter view is supported by 2 Chronicles 32:31, which describes envoys who traveled to the land where the miracle occurred.

Joshua and Hezekiah both made lofty requests of the Lord, that the very heavens might be altered. And God answered their prayers. The sun, moon, and stars obey the Creator who placed them in the sky by the power of his word.”

I also found an article that NASA may have found that “missing” day.  It is an interesting and though provoking read.  Regardless of the conclusions you may draw, I do know that God’s word says it is true, and I choose to believe it.

Psalm 119:160 – “All your words are true; all your righteous laws are eternal.”

Sarah

Genesis 17:15-19 “Then God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. “I will bless her, and indeed I will give you a  son by her. Then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings  of peoples will come from her.”  Then Abraham fell  on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, “Will a child be born to a man one hundred years old? And will  Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?”  And Abraham said to God, “Oh that Ishmael might live before You!”  But God said, “No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.”

Genesis 21:1-3 “ Then  the LORD took note of Sarah as He had said, and the LORD did for Sarah as He had promised.   So Sarah conceived and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the appointed time of which God had spoken to him. Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac.“

This yarn is was inspired by a dear friend of mine, whose youngest daughter is named Sara.  I asked her to guest blog for me why she chose these colors and what it means to her.

She wrote:

“Hi Lamar!

Well, as I’ve been thinking about Sara, and what we love about her and who she is and why she’s unique and important, this is what I’ve come up with.

Sara was the baby we fought hardest to have. I’d like to say we prayed and prayed that God would grant us a child, and that we did it with grace and faith, but after two losses (and one of them difficult and gruesome in ways I can’t easily speak) our faith was ragged. We knew God had another child for us, but we had grown weary in the journey. Most of our time spent praying was for Christ to grant us our courage and faith so that we could continue. It was tough.

Being pregnant with Sara was hard, too. I felt I had been carrying a baby for 18 months, off and on, and that she would never come. I did some hardcore nesting right around the time Twinkle should have been born, then I did a tailspin into depression before I realized what I was experiencing was that loss over again…and STILL pregnant.

God did give us our baby. And she is the delight of our lives. She is bright and funny. She is sympathetic (so early, only 13 months!) and gives hugs and kisses and love to all. She has a queenly, imperious way about her and has definite desires that she expresses aggressively, but with smiles. She has always loved music (none of my other children really noticed it till they were 9 months old) and we dance her to sleep at night now that she has eschewed the nighttime nursing session. I adore her. We all do.

We named her after Isaac’s mother, the woman who waited much longer than we for her one and only child.

Sara looks best in bright darks. So, deep reds, royal purple and royal blue, deep pinks, black is better on her . I think that suits her personality and purpose, too. Even though she is bitty, she is mighty.”

Nothing’s Impossible

Nothing’s Impossible

Originally uploaded by atimetodye

Matthew 17:14-20 “And when they had come to the multitude, a man came to Him, kneeling down to Him and saying, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and suffers severely; for he often falls into the fire and often into the water. So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him.” Then Jesus answered and said, “O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to Me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured from that very hour. Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, “Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. “

The Queen

The Queen

Originally uploaded by atimetodye

Esther 1: 11-15,19 “He commanded them…to bring Queen Vashti before the king, wearing her royal crown, in order to show her beauty to the people and the officials, for she was beautiful to behold. But Queen Vashti refused to come at the king’s command brought by his eunuchs; therefore the king was furious, and his anger burned within him. The king said “What shall we do to Queen Vashti, according to law, because she did not obey the command of King Ahasuerus brought to her by the eunuchs?” The eunuch replied, “If it pleases the king, let a royal decree go out from him, and let it be recorded in the laws of the Persians and the Medes, so that it will not be altered, that Vashti shall come no more before King Ahasuerus; and let the king give her royal position to another who is better than she.”

Drink

Drink

Originally uploaded by atimetodye

Matthew 26: 27,28– “Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.”

Eat

Eat

Originally uploaded by atimetodye

Matthew 26:26 – “And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, “Take, eat; this is My body.”