Resting and Reflexion

                                       We rest on Thee, Our Strength and our Redeemer

                                       We go not forth alone against the foe.

                                       Strong in Thy strength, safe in Thy keeping tender,

                                       We rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go.

This has been one of our favorite hymns since we first sang it at the memorial service of a dear fellow missionary in Burkina Faso.  It’s sung to the tune of “Be Still My Soul.”  I keep a copy of it in my Bible and love to sing it.  This morning as I was singing it, I realized how powerful and comforting the words are.  We’re not alone in this new endeavor;  we can REST totally on the One who called us here.  How reassuring is that!   I have experienced the opposite of resting a couple of times since arriving here—a major melt-down one night as well as several times when the anxieties of being here clogged up my thinking.   Resting on One who is solidly secure and always good all the time is so much better.

I like the third verse too:

                                       We go in faith, our own great weakness feeling,

                                       And needing more each day Thy face to know
                                       Yet from our hearts a song of triumph pealing,

                                       We rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go.

**This hymn was the one sung by the missionaries in Ecuador the night before Jim Elliot and his comrades left for their final mission.   

These days of house hunting have been good for my reflexion, alone time.  I’ve been reading Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership by Barton and challenged by some of her thinking:

“What would it look like for me to lead more consistently from my soul-the place of my own encounter with God-rather than leading primarily from my head, my unbridled activism, or my performance-oriented drivenness?” p.25

  “Those who are looking to us for spiritual sustenance need us first and foremost to be spiritual seekers ourselves.  They need us to keep searching for the bread of life that feeds our own souls so that we can guide them to a place of sustenance for their own souls.  Then rather than offering the cold stone of past devotionals, regurgitated apologetics or someone else’s musings about the spiritual life, we will have bread to offer that is warm from the oven of our intimacy with God.” p. 29

Good thoughts to ponder.