Spontaneous Song

Birthed at TLC during Sunday Morning Worship Service

I’ve never known a love like this before

That wraps me in the arms of holiness

And I’ve never known a love like this, like this before

That wraps me in the arms of purity

There is no other love like yours oh Lord

No other extravagant love

No other love like yours

So I come into your chambers

And I worship you

As I dance at your feet Lord

And I let your love just pour, pour over me

Washing away the hurt

Washing away the pain

Washing away the disappointment I have lived through

I let your love cover me

Oh let His love cover you today

There is no other love like His

So intimate

So pure

So Holy

There is no other love like His

So intimate

So pure

So Holy

So let the Father wrap his arms around you

Let His love enfold you

Let Him touch you to the depths of you as deep calls,

Deep calls out to deep

Let His love cover you

‘Cause His love covers a multitude of sin

"The Birth of Humility"

There are so many ways in which Christ continues to remind me of His meekness and humility.   We hear the Christmas story told over and over again, we use words like he came to a lowly manger, was born into a lowly family.  But it isn't Jesus' surroundings or his lineage that has struck me for the past two years. Surely you can't overlook the fact that these surroundings and this lineage do point to the emptying of self that is Jesus' principle character, His humility.  But consider this.....Jesus came to earth as a baby!  The most vulnerable people in our society in my opinion are the elderly and children.  God did not have to send His son through a womb. Jesus did not have to agree to come to earth under those conditions.  He came as the "Second Adam" and Adam knew no womb other than the Holy Spirit Hovering over a formless and void universe.  Have you ever wonder what it takes for The God of the Universe to allow himself to be reduced to a seed in the womb of a teenager and for The Father of all to entrust His Only Begotten Son to human parents?  The Humility of Christ continues to astonish me. His willingness to reduce Himself for us, while we kick and scream at the simple notion of being humbled.  Then I think of what the Word says in Hebrews that He learned obedience by the things He suffered.  I think to myself, all of the circumstances of His birth should indicate that He had no need to learn more humility, and once again I am amazed at my Lord who continued the process of the emptying of self until death.  Lord take me on this journey of learning humility, that more and more I will become conformed to your likeness!

MY friend Jamila

This is a blog from my Friend Jamila..what an inspiration ...I had to post her blog, hope you enjoy as much as I.  I have known Jamila only a short while, but she has impacted my life tremendously you will see why as you read!!!!

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

The Humbling

I've had this experience a few times over my last few years of travels. You are walking around some well known tourist site - a slave market, some ruins, an old fort....or sometimes you are simply walking through a busy market, sitting on some water's edge...and suddenly an awareness of all the hundreds, thousands of years of civilization that walked where I walked, or stood where I stood, becomes so real to me. All of a sudden, you feel so very small...the world seems to swirl around you and a simple realization takes hold: This world will go on without me...in fact it has gone on for centuries upon centuries. This, I think, is the universal "humbling".

This weekend as I walked around the ruins of the acient city of Petra. Petra was inhabited by the Nabataeans from as early as 312 B.C. We spent the entire day wondering around the ruins, of which only 20% have been excavated. From the Nabataens, then the Romans, to the Bedouins (who still lived in Petra until they were moved out by the Jordanian goverment a few years ago), this very place has witnessed countless births, deaths, marriages, celebrations...wars, disasters. It has been home to several forms of government, witnessed different times of economic relations and trade, and dealt with the hardship of resource management. I stood in Petra and I was humbled. And you know what? The moment I stood there was like a spec of dust in the light of the years of history I was standing on.

A little humbling is good sometimes....


A glimpse of the "Treasury" at Petra (from the Roman times)


The magnificent Treasury.


Camels at Petra


Nabataean tombs in Petra dating back to 312 BC

Hebrews 12: 1-13 The Message Bible

1 Do you see what this means - all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we'd better get on with it. Strip down, start running - and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. 2 Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we're in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed - that exhilarating finish in and with God - he could put up with anything along the way: cross, shame, whatever. And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. 3 When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!

4 In this all-out match against sin, others have suffered far worse than you, to say nothing of what Jesus went through - all that bloodshed! 5 So don't feel sorry for yourselves. Or have you forgotten how good parents treat children, and that God regards you as his children? My dear child, don't shrug off God's discipline, but don't be crushed by it either. 6 It's the child he loves that he disciplines; the child he embraces, he also corrects. 7 God is educating you; that's why you must never drop out. He's treating you as dear children. This trouble you're in isn't punishment; it's training, 8 the normal experience of children. Only irresponsible parents leave children to fend for themselves. Would you prefer an irresponsible God? 9 We respect our own parents for training and not spoiling us, so why not embrace God's training so we can truly live? 10 While we were children, our parents did what seemed best to them. But God is doing what is best for us, training us to live God's holy best. 11 At the time, discipline isn't much fun. It always feels like it's going against the grain. Later, of course, it pays off handsomely, for it's the well-trained who find themselves mature in their relationship with God. 12 So don't sit around on your hands! No more dragging your feet!

13 Clear the path for long-distance runners so no one will trip and fall, so no one will step in a hole and sprain an ankle. Help each other out. And run for it!