All Things Bright & Beautiful

 

Refrain: 

All things bright and beautiful,  

 All creatures great and small, 

All things wise and wonderful, 

The Lord God made them all. 

Each little flow'r that opens,

Each little bird that sings, 

He made their glowing colors, 

He made their tiny wings. [Refrain]  

The purple-headed mountain 

The river running by,

The sunset and the morning 

That brightens up the sky. [Refrain]  

The cold wind in the winter, 

The pleasant summer sun, 

The ripe fruits in the garden: 

He made them every one. [Refrain] 

He gave us eyes to see them, 

And lips that we might tell 

How great is God Almighty, 

Who has made all things well. [Refrain]

-Cecil Frances Alexander, 1848 [female]

Cecil Frances Alexander

The Lord Will Provide

Though troubles assail 

And dangers affright, 

Though friends should all fail 

And foes all unite; 

Yet one thing secures us, 

Whatever betide, 

The scripture assures us, 

The Lord will provide. 

The birds without barn 

Or storehouse are fed, 

From them let us learn 

To trust for our bread: 

His saints, what is fitting, 

Shall ne’er be denied, 

So long as ’tis written, 

The Lord will provide.

We may, like the ships, 

By tempest be tossed 

On perilous deeps, 

But cannot be lost. 

Though Satan enrages 

The wind and the tide, 

The promise engages, 

The Lord will provide. 

His call we obey 

Like Abram of old, 

Not knowing our way, 

But faith makes us bold; 

For though we are strangers 

We have a good Guide, 

And trust in all dangers, 

The Lord will provide. 

When Satan appears 

To stop up our path, 

And fill us with fears, 

We triumph by faith; 

He cannot take from us, 

Though oft he has tried, 

This heart–cheering promise, 

The Lord will provide. 

He tells us we’re weak, 

Our hope is in vain, 

The good that we seek 

We ne’er shall obtain, 

But when such suggestions 

Our spirits have plied, 

This answers all questions, 

The Lord will provide. 

No strength of our own, 

Or goodness we claim, 

Yet since we have known 

The Savior’s great name; 

In this our strong tower 

For safety we hide, 

The Lord is our power, 

The Lord will provide. 

When life sinks apace 

And death is in view, 

This word of his grace 

Shall comfort us through: 

No fearing or doubting 

With Christ on our side, 

We hope to die shouting, 

The Lord will provide.

 —John Newton (1725-1807) from Olney Hymns, 1779 [author of "Amazing Grace"]

[The fountain in its source]

The fountain in its source

No drought of summer fears;

The farther it pursues its course

The nobler it appears.

But shallow cisterns yield

A scanty short supply;

The morning sees them amply filled,

At evening they are dry.

    --Madame de la Mothe Guion (1648-1717), translated by William Cowper  (1731-1800)

     This poem is not "Christian", per se, but Cowper certainly was.  His work is featured on both of my blogs.  There are links to his amazing life story. Madame Guion was also a fervent Christian, seeking private devotional disciplines.   

     The poem gives an overall sense of a giving, active life being preferable.  The flowing, active fountain which freely gives of itself never has to "worry" about running dry.   The still cisterns, from which people come and take what they want, do have that "concern.

     Cowper ended up living in the vicinity of Olney, England. There he was friends and a joint hymn-writer with John Newton, author of "Amazing Grace."  Though Americans are much more familiar with Newton, Cowper has had more fame in the UK.  (As noted elsewhere, Cowper was the favorite poet of author Jane Austen.)

   

  

Olney still hosts the Cowper and Newton Museum.  On its premises are Cowper's Summer House.  After his death, a book was published about the place.  "Fans" showed up and wrote on its walls, some of which is still visible today.

"Light Shines out of Darkness" (Cowper; with biographical notes)

[Joy & Peace in Believing] (Cowper)

"The [Slave's] Complaint" (Cowper, plus biographical link; Witticisms & Aphorisms Blog)

"I Will Praise the Lord at All Times" (Cowper)

Quotable Cowper (with biographical link; Witticisms & Aphorisms Blog)

Lamb of God

 "Look, the Lamb of God,

Who takes away the sin of the world!"  

      (John 1:29b, 36b)

So said John the Baptist,

The voice of one who calls out. (Isaiah 40:3)

He is the Lamb of God,

Not the Ram of God.

"Your Lamb must be unblemished,

A one-year-old male..."  

     (Exodus 12:5a; Leviticus l4:10; Ezekiel 46:13)

Most things are cleaned with blood:

Without the shedding of blood,

There is no forgiveness.  (Hebrews 9:22)

Make One still young the offering,

The last of such bloody suffering; (Daniel 9:27)

Yet His soul shall rise to see

The spiritual children He brought to be.  (Isaiah 53:10)

The Ancient Lamb not very old;

With blood worth more than even gold:

It sets the human captives free

From sin's eternal misery.  (I Peter 1:19; Exodus, etc)

How much more will the Blood of Christ,--

He who offered Himself to God

Through the Eternal Spirit

As an unblemished sacrifice--

Cleanse our consciences from dead works

To serve the Living God?  (Hebrews 9:14)

As a lamb to the slaughter He was led;

And as a sheep before her shearers is silent,

So He did not open His mouth.  (Isaiah 53:7b)

"And I, 

If I be lifted up from the earth,

I will draw all people to myself."  (John 12:32) 

So taught the Lamb

Before His time had come.

"The Son of Man 

Must suffer many things.

He must be killed,

And on the third day raised to life."

  (Luke 9:21, 43, 18:31; Mark 9:32; Matthew 17:23)

Myriads of myriads, 

Thousands of thousands,

Angels and elders 

All saying with a loud voice,

"Worthy is the Lamb,

Who was slaughtered,

To receive power and wealth and wisdom

And might and honor and glory and blessing!"  

     (Revelation 5:12)  

For the Lamb,

The One in the center of the throne,

Will shepherd them.

And He will lead them 

To Living Fountains of Waters.  (Revelation 7:17a)

                 --translations & short verse c.m.b. (c) 2024

The Months

 
January brings the snow,

Makes our feet and fingers glow.

February brings the rain*,

Thaws the frozen lake again.

March brings breezes large and shrill,

Stirs the dancing daffodil.

April brings the primrose sweet,

Scatters daisies at our feet.

May brings flocks of pretty lambs,

Skipping by their fleecy damns.

June brings tulips, lilies, roses,

Fills the children's hands with posies.

Hot July brings cooling showers,

Apricots and gillyflowers**.

August brings the sheaves of corn***,

Then the harvest home is borne.

Warm September brings the fruit,

Sportsmen then begin to shoot.

Fresh October brings the pheasants,

Then to gather nuts is pleasant.

Dull November brings the blast,

Then the leaves are whirling fast.

Chill December brings the sleet*,

Blazing fire and Christmas treat. 

     ---Sara Coleridge (1802-1852)

     English writer Sara Coleridge is most known as the only daughter of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and an editor of his work, particularly after her father and her husband died.  However, she was an author and translator in her own right.

     In the 21st century, a discovery of over 100 of her unpublished poems was made.  A lecturer at University College, London, Dr. Swaab, discovered them in the Coleridge manuscripts and published them in 2007.

*Many places in the northern hemisphere will still snow in December & February. The British Isles, being smallish and surrounded by water, do not always have the conditions for snow.

**Gillyflowers:  most often, another term for "carnations", though the term may be applied to other flowers,

***Corn: old-school, Old World, meant "wheat" (whereas New World "corn" was called some variant of "maize.")

****Though this poem is not overtly religious, Sara was.  She opposed the Oxford Movement (Tractarian Movement), in the 1840s.  The movement led to an Anglican Church that was more "high church" or more similar to Roman Catholicism, as opposed to other protestant ideas present in England.  [Gerard Manly Hopkins, whose work is featured elsewhere in this blog, did approve of the Tractarian Movement.  Eventually he went so far as to formally become Roman Catholic.]

Waterfall

      These photos are from a hike into Zapata Falls in south central Colorado last year.  The waterfalls are in the Sangre de Cristo ("Blood of Christ") Range within the Rocky Mountains.  (For more on our trip there, see the post from October, 2020.)

      Some fresh translations from Psalm 42 add to the reflections.

7) Deep calls unto deep

At the noise of Your waterfalls; 

And all your waves and billows

Over me have passed.

8) In the daytime will Yahweh command His lovingkindness,

And in the night will his song be with me--

   a prayer to the God of my life...

11) Why, O my soul, are you cast down,

And why are you disquieted within me? 

Have hope in God,

For yet shall I praise Him,

The salvation of my expression [literally 'face']

And my God.    --Sons of Korah  

Notice how the falls spill from rocks high above.  Hikers are not allowed in that area.

    For fans of the Chronicles of Narnia, which are Christian allegories, waterfalls are in many stories.  C.S. Lewis' upbringing in parts of Ireland contributed to his depictions of Narnia.  I like occasionally mentioning Narnia in this blog because Lewis does such an amazing job describing the landscape.  It is part of the great joy of going to Narnia. The Hollywood productions (as Hollywood will do) focus so much on the great breathtaking near escapes that the amount of time just absorbing natural wonders is lost.

     Lewis does mentions a number of waterfalls throughout The Chronicles of Narnia. The most well-known is in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, where the Beavers take the Pevensie children along the ravine below a waterfall in order to avoid being caught by the White Witch.  She traveled by sled and couldn't follow them down the narrow space. 

    The Great Waterfall is at the furthest western limit of Narnia.  Falling over spectacular cliffs into Cauldron Pool, it becomes the source of the Great River. 

    In the last book. The Last Battle, the trickster ape, Shift, lives near these falls.  He finds a lion skin in Cauldron Pool and tricks his foolish donkey friend, Puzzle, into wearing it and pretending to be Aslan, the Great Lion (the metaphor for Jesus).  This great hoax brings down Narnia.  

    At the end of Narnia, as the move into ever greater, more beautiful eternal Narnias, Aslan's dearest go UP the great waterfall, in a way they never could have done in their previous lives.  (Imagine climbing those!)  I could not find any artist renditions of the beloved going up the Narnian falls, so I will leave you with these final Zapata Falls photos.  My husband took these.  If you look close, you can see me in blue shirt with the giant straw hat, which I refer to as my "ugly potato farmer's hat."  (This is not to imply that potato farmers are ugly, only that my hat is.)  It has warded off skin cancer, though!  And then he took one of me closer up, getting the photos you saw above.  What a day it would have been if we COULD have ascended the falls!

Backyard Flowers

      

     Once again, our backyard is awash with blooms before the insane heat of summers here takes off.  We were blessed with far more rain than is typical, plus some cooler weather, this winter and spring.

     Towards the end, you'll see the lemon blossoms.  You may catch sight of parts of the lemon fruits in these pictures.  You'll also see some of the lemon bushes near the bachelor's buttons [see below]. I say bushes because this is how citrus naturally grows.  To have 'trees', you have to repeatedly prune lower branches and paint the trunks white to prevent various types of damage.  We let ours go as shrubs, and we get a LOT of lemons.  This also allowed a second bush to grow up as a root shoot, filling a spot where we had cut out a thorny bougainvillea bush.  (We have one of those in the front yard, not pictured here.  It has hot pink, papery 'rays' around a cluster of small white flowers.  It's surprising this bougainvillea blooms anymore, considering its age and how many times it has been trimmed back.) 

     This year, there are a lot of Icelandic-type poppies in various colors.  (Our California poppies show foliage but no blooms yet.  You can check out some of the previous posts that show backyard blooms in past years.  You'll see the orange California poppies there.  Use the menu item with my name.)  Poppies are in the "mallow family", along with hibiscus and other flowers.

     There are also the 'cornflower blue' bachelor's buttons, or chicory.  Yes, the roots of these are used to make the ground chicory southerners use in coffee sometimes.  A couple of our bachelor's buttons, in close proximity, are about 3-1/2 feet (slightly over one meter) tall. These flowering plants are closely related to dandelions.  All of these are in the "composite family", which includes sunflowers and daisies.  (Discussions of composite flowers are in my older posts on backyard blooms.)

    Speaking of daisies in the composite family, there's a spot of orange in some of these pictures. This is an African daisy.  We actually had bigger swaths of both yellow and orange African daisies in other sections of the yard.  They've mostly bloomed out and gone to seed.

    Return readers may recall that my favorite flower is the black-eyed Susan.  Though it is rather hot for them by the time we get enough hours of sun to suit them here, we've had some success off and on the past few years getting some to bloom.  (It took years and lots of over-seeding for any success.)  I believe I saw the foliage of one 'Susan' tucked away.)

     Yet one other bloom on the scrawny looking shrub is one form of plant we call 'bird of paradise' here.  It comes in a blue and purple blooming variety and a yellow and orange blooming variety.  There is a completely different type of flower, striking in fiery shades, which blooms here also called bird of paradise. The bloom is somewhat bird shaped.  We do not have those.

    Please enjoy what we do have.  For those of you still "shivering" in colder climes, maybe this will perk you up.  Spare us some sympathy when we're broiling by the end of May!

Mountain Lore

     These photos are from a recent trip to Great Sand Dunes National Park in southern Colorado.  The dunes are some of the largest natural dunes in the US, created by unique forces working in this area of the Rio Grande.  The mountains are part of the Sangre de Cristo ("Blood of Christ") range within the North American Rocky Mountains. (Spanish explorers applied the name centuries ago because reddish light reflecting off snow caps suggested this.)  This area is collectively referred to as The San Luis Valley.

    Included is some Biblical poetry about mountains.  

     This is a reminder of how God promised Abraham that his descendants would be as sands along the seashore (Genesis 22:17 & 26:4).

I will lift up my eyes unto the hills

From whence comes my help.  (Psalm 121:1)

Great is Yahweh and greatly to be praised

In the city of our God,

The mountain of His holiness. (Ps. 48:1)

Who may ascend upon the Mount of Yahweh?

And who may stand in the place of His holiness? (Psalm 24:3)

In [Yahweh's] Hand are the depths of the earth,

And the heights of the hills are His.  (Ps. 95:4) [original translations] 

     The person who stand in the place of Yahweh's holiness is the person whose sin has been forgiven by Jesus. We see this spelled out in other places in the Bible.

     Mountains seem almost eternal and unmovable.  Yet God can move them.  Jesus spoke of having "the faith to move mountains."  (Matthew 17:20) 

     A hill is also a place which can be seen from far away on the plain.  From atop a mountain, things can be seen for miles around. Many Biblical events took place on hills or mountains.  The 10 Commandments were given to Moses on Mt. Sinai. Part of Jesus' temptation in the wilderness occurred on a mountain. Jesus was 'transfigured' (radiating bright as the Sun) on a mountain.  Jesus prayed with His disciples the night of His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives.  Jesus was crucified on the hill at Golgatha.  Jesus ascended into heaven from a mountain near Bethany, traditionally the Mount of Olives.