Morning Moments

One of my favorite books is Love Slaves by Samuel Logan Brengle. I would like to share a portion of his writing with you today. It is from a chapter called "My Testimony" These are his words:

"Today (June 1, 1919) I am fifty-nine years old, and there is not a cloud in my spiritual heaven. My mouth is full of laughter and my heart is full of joy. I feel so sorry for folks who don't like to grow old, and who are trying all the time to hide the fact that they are growing old, and who are ashamed to tell how old they are. I revel in my years. They enrich me. If God should say to me, 'I will let you begin over again, and you may have your youth back once more,' I should say, 'O dear Lord, if Thou dost not mind, I prefer to go on growing old!'
I would not exchange the peace of mind, the abiding rest of soul, the measure of wisdom I have gained from the sweet and bitter and perplexing experiences of life, the confirmed faith I now have in the moral order of the universe, and in the unfailing mercies and love of God, for all the bright but uncertain hopes and tumultuous joys of youth. Indeed, I would not!
These are the best years of my life -- the sweetest, the freest from anxious care and fear. The way grows brighter, the birds sing sweeter, the winds blow softer, the sun shines more radiantly than ever before. I suppose my outward man is perishing, but my inward man is being joyously renewed day by day.
Victor Hugo said (I quote from memory): 'For fifty years I have been expressing myself in sonnet and song, in history, biography, essays, philosophy, drama, tragedy, and fiction, but I have not expressed a thousandth part of what is within me.' And then he added, 'The frosts of seventy winters are upon my head, but the springtime of eternal youth is in my heart.' Truly, that is the way I feel these days
One of the prayers of my heart, as I grow older, is that of David: 'Now, also, when I am old and grey-headed, O God, forsake me not until I have showed Thy strength unto this generation and Thy power to every one that is to come!' David was jealous for the glory of God and for the highest well-being of his own generation and every generation that was to follow, and he prayed no selfish prayer, but poured out his heart to God that he might so live and speak and write that God's glory and goodness and power might be made known to the men of his own time and to all that should come after him. And how wonderfully God heard and answered his prayer! Oh, that God would grant me a like grace!"

PRAYER: Father teach us to live every day as if it were our last, not in regret, but in rejoicing; not merely waiting, but worshipping; not as those are filled with dread and anxiety, but as those who are filled with delight and anticipation. Today, teach me moment by moment I am safe in your care, and that I do not have to fear what is before me for you are there already preparing the way for me. I love you, Lord, and with all my heart wish to please you in every way.