A Net in Time

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Review: Psalm Hymns: Books 1,2,3

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Do you love to sing scripture?  Singing back to God the words he gave to his people?

L.L. Larkin has come up with a book to do just that and I really really like it.  It is called :  Psalm Hymns, Books 1, 2, & 3: Dramatic, Contemplative, Singable, Recitable Psalms!

No boring unsingable tunes.  But simple easily recognized tunes with the words of the Psalms.    

Let me tell you more. 

I actually received two versions of this book, which appear to be identical within.  The only different being the cover.   You’ll see the one cover here, and the other cover pictured below.

This book is FILLED with scripture written to the tune of familiar songs and hymns.


 Singing scripture to music is one of the best ways to learn scripture.  I remember when I was in bible college needing to memorize a great deal of scripture, I’d say them in my head until I got a tune going. That’s the premise behind this book.  Put scripture to music, particularly familiar music and watch people learn the word of God.

Easy enough eh?

This first book goes up to Psalm 89 and has us singing the Psalms to the tunes of Rock of Ages, Jesus Loves Me. Jesus keep me near the cross and At Calvary.

Various notes are found after some of the psalms.  Some speak to how other musicians used the psalm in music, others to the message found in the passage.

I have to admit, I had some mixed thoughts about these notes.  I loved knowing how other artists used that particular psalm, but wasn’t sure if it was really a part of a music book to also act a bit as a commentary.   Pros and cons right?  I liked what he had to say, but wondered if the book could be a bit shorter with less commentary.

 I found the words to the psalms followed the meaning of the Psalms quite nicely.  This book will be going into our “keep it” pile for use later on learning some Psalms.

IF you are music director in a church, or a sunday school leader or choir director you may find this book a boon to you as you strive to teach new music to your people.  Homeschool families with an emphasis on memorizing scripture may also find this book an aid in helping your students appreciate the beauty and teaching found within the Psalms.  Help them write God’s word upon their hearts!

Title: Psalm Hymns, Books 1, 2, & 3: Dramatic, Contemplative, Singable, Recitable Psalms!
Author: L.L. Larkins
Series: Psalm Hymns
Publisher: Capture Books
Pages: 290
Type: music, psalter

Reviewed for: BookCrash 

Where can I find it?
Amazon.ca: Psalm Hymns, books 1,2, 3
Amazon.com: Psalm Hymns, Books 1, 2, & 3: Dramatic, Contemplative, Singable, Recitable Psalms!

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

Completely Protected

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Today we are looking at Romans 8:31-39.

Do you remember that future hope that we need to wait for patiently?  How God has foreknown us, called us, justified us and glorified us?

romans 8

 

So Paul has this question for us… What do you say to these things?

 31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
 If God is for us (and he is otherwise why do all these things for us?)   So God, the greatest being in the universe, he is for us.   Therefore.. think about this for a moment or three… WHO possibly could be against us?   WHO?
 
  32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?
God didn’t spare his own son, he willingly gave him up for all of us.  So do you not think that he will ever so graciously give us all things?   Don’t you think he would do that?

I read these words and I feel so humbled, so shamed by my lack in seeing God’s goodness to me.  So brought low by my questionings and my doubts and my fears.   God is ever so gracious… why can’t I see that more clearly all the time?

Check out these comparisons eh? 

33 Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 
34 Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. 
35 Who
shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or
distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
    we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”
Do you see it?   Do you see how fully protected we are?  No charges can be brought against God’s own people.  God has us covered.  No one can condemn us.  Christ’s death has us covered.  Can we be separated from God?  NO!  Not hardship, no sadness, no persecution, no hunger, no nakedness, no danger and no warfare.. NOTHING can separate us from God.  We are his own.. always.

Ah.. this is comfort and a reality.  See this, hear these words, know it to be so. We are so entwined with God that we are just so safe within his love and his graciousness toward us.
 

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor
height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to
separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Can you see how that makes us conquerors?  If we have nothing to fear.. no judges, rulers, condemnation, hunger, warfare, danger, sadness, persecution, hardship.. if we don’t need to fear any of that… then we are conquerors in whatever situation we find ourselves in.   Consider what that means.   We should then have boldness in proclaiming who the Lord God is to us eh?   To find the words and not worry on what people think of us.Just to say what the Lord is doing in our lives and how that matters to us.  Trying, just trying to give a glimpse of the hope we have within us.  Think on it.  (I know it’s making me think!)

Because we have to remember this stated promise that Paul gives us: 
  38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor
height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to
separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
 
NOTHING!  Not one single thing can separate us from the love of God that is Christ Jesus our Lord.  NOT ONE SINGLE THING. Isn’t that just the single coolest thing you have read today?  Imagine how very safe that makes you.

So safe you probably can’t even put it into words if you are like me.  Just overwhelmed by the magnitude of God’s care and protection of me, his child.   Not even death can separate me.   I am his… tell me.. are you?  Don’t you want that extreme care and protection that will last forever?   Remember.. death can’t separate us from God.  It just can’t.  It doesn’t have the power to do so.   

If you want to know how you can have this eternal protection and care extended toward, drop me a line, I’d be happy to talk with you. 
 

What say you? 

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

Can we wait patiently for that future glory?

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Today we are reading from Romans 8:18-30.

This morning on facebook I read about a young lady who is going through a hard time medically speaking, and today (or I suppose rather yesterday) it was an emotionally tough one.  One of the commenters mentioned that surgery scars are a sign of a battle fought and shouldn’t be seen as ugly but as a sign of victory.  Mourn the need of them us, but truly see them as they are.  With that in mind.. when I read the first verse of this section it makes sense you know?


  For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 
The suffering, the mourning for now is temporary.  Look what faces us in the future?  A future glory awaits!!
 
 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
Can you see how ALL of creation is waiting for this new future?  The groaning and complaining and the mourning that we all do.  We have a future hope!  One day we will be set free from this world plagued by sin.   One day, one day there will be a complete victory over sin, and until then, until then we’ll have the battle scars to prove the battle we are in until we attain that future glory.

  24 For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Now mind this.   We CANNOT SEE IT yet.  It’s not hope if it’s already here.  We can catch glimpses of it.. but until it is actually here we only have that hope that we cling to with patience (and admittedly at times with not so much patience).

Sometimes I see what sin does in the world and I just want it gone.  A friend’s child dealing with anxiety, a friend in hospital with cancer, another friend’s daughter suffering with medical stuff, teens falling into sinful behaviour of wanton destruction of other people’s property, cops in hospital, fires in British Columbia and so much more, sometimes I just want it to end, to see that hope that awaits us when sin can no longer affect the world we live in.   Won’t that be a good thing???
  
26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. 27 And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
 This
is a passage I have to admit I don’t always really understand at a heart/spirit level.  I
understand that the Holy Spirit helps me pray when I just don’t have the
words, and that he truly knows my heart and mind as he intercedes on my
behalf with God the Father.  I get that intellectually.  I just struggle with it I guess.  I never had an issue that has me groaning under the weight of it I suppose.  But maybe, I don’t know, maybe when I am weighed down with the cares of others, maybe that weight is what the Spirit takes before the Lord when I just don’t know what to do or think?   Or maybe when I get frustrated with myself because I know that I love God but so often I feel like I am deluding myself and everyone else and then the Spirit calls out to God for me because I just don’t have it in me to face that continual fear.  And so the Spirit then calls out to the Lord for me and I find myself reassured again in ways I don’t always anticipate. I don’t know….
 
  28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
My sweetheart says often that this verse (28) is often misunderstood and misused.  That people fail to see the “for those who are called according to his purpose”.   They just see “God works all things for good”.  They sometimes fail to see the WORK TOGETHER part as well.  It’s a whole package deal you know?  God calls a people who love him together.  A people that he foreknows.  A people that he is conforming to the image of his Son.  An adopted people into his family, those people, those that he predestined, called, justified and glorified.  THIS people God will works all things TOGETHER for good. 
 
 And in this knowing… we wait!  We wait for that future glory, the hope that rests inside of all who believe, knowing something better is coming. Can you wait for that hope?
 
  What say you? 

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here. 

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

We are Heirs of God.

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Today we are reading from Romans 8:12-17.

12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.


I read these words and you know what my first thought was…would I rather be a slave or a debtor?  Then I wondered where that thought came from.

Cause I got to thinking about some cultures if you save a person’s life they are indebted to you and must serve you.   I wonder if that came from the seed that God plants in our hearts about him?

But Christ died for us.  Freeing us from the bond we had, the having to follow the path of sin.  So he in essence saved our lives.

ERGO we owe him a great debt. 

Since we owe him a great debt, should we therefore continue in the path of the flesh?  Of course not!  We owe him a debt, we should live to the life that he has brought us to.

The life we are brought to was that of being a child of God.  An heir of God in essence and reality.  To be a CHILD to God.  That’s what happened when he saved us.  

Should a child of God himself fall back into slavery?

Hold to that.  Believe it.  Listen to the Spirit of God as he whispers it in  your heart.  YOU ARE A CHILD OF GOD.   An adopted, for real, child of God.  

These words caught my eye:
and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
You know how good families stick together through thick and thin? Minding each other, watching each other’s back, going through the good and the bad with each other?   This happens in God’s family too.  Hard things will happen.. times of suffering and pain.  Don’t run away from it.  Stick through it. 

When our brothers and sisters in Islamic countries suffer… pray for them, care about what happens to them. When Christian business owners are attacked, send them letters of encouragement.  We are family regardless of where we live, what colour our skin is, our size, shape, national dialect.   So if we know that one of us is suffering, we suffer to along with them.  So be an encouragement and help!

Together, let us be glorified with Christ!
 
 What say you? 

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here. 

The image I used for the graphic was originally this, and came from my brothers’ portfolio.  You can see more of his images here.   I just love the bird looking out of the hole looking for protected and safe and yet curious about what’s going on outside.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

No Condemnation

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Today we are reading from Romans 8:1-11.

 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 
 Oh!   I love this verse don’t you?   To think that if we are in Christ, there is no condemnation heaped upon our heads!  Why?  Because we’ve been freed from slavery to sin!

 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 
The Law of the Spirit has set us free!  Think on that a spell!   FREEDOM!   No condemnation. That’s what the Lord God has wrought for us.  

3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 
It’s what GOD did.  Our flesh couldn’t… it was too weakened by sin to do anything about the state it was in…but God is above our flesh, above our weakness, so he fulfilled the law so that we could have that freedom to walk in the Spirit. 
 
 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. 8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
See…see the advantage of living by the Spirit?   It changes your outlook on life.  It changes mine!   I know it gives me the ability to look for the positive in situations where finding the positive can be a challenge, but God hides blessings in places we don’t expect, so living by the Spirit keeps us open to that, you know what I mean??

I read verse 6-8 and I think oh.. how I struggle.  I WANT my mind to be fixed on the things of the Spirit and so often I find it so hostile to God. caught up in the things of the world around me.   I DO NOT want to be in a mindset that is hostile to God.  I don’t.   So how do I balance this dichotomy within?
 
9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.
Paul is so gracious… so full of reminders that if I am in Christ, I am living by the Spirit.  I am. BUT if I don’t have the Spirit of Christ within me… you know what that means?  It means that I do not belong to God, that I am not in Christ, that I am therefore living by the flesh, a state that is hostile to God.    So, if I have accepted Christ’s work on my behalf, believing in his death and resurrection for me a sinner, than his Spirit lives in me.  Therefore I am not living in a way hostile to God.    OH…Oh.. that I would remember that more clearly more often.  It would help me make better decisions eh?

What say you? 

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.  
 

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

The Delight vs The Captivity

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Today we are reading from Romans 7:8-25.

 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
Can you see what sin does in a body?  It seizes opportunities. It uses the commands, the laws, to produce covetousness.  A great desire to possess something.  It makes us want something that we don’t have.   Can you see that?  The law of God was meant to be freeing, but it wasn’t.  The presence of the law revealed the heart…that heart that longs for something more.  BE MINDFUL therefore…what do you covet?  Don’t let it deceive you.  Look for what it holy, righteous and good.


13 Did
that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin,
producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be
shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond
measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
Paul asks himself, if I know that the law is good, did it then bring me death?   The answer to that is NO.  It was sin that produced death using what is good (the law).  This shows sin to be sin.   Paul tells us how often he does what he doesn’t want to do.  I don’t know you about but I’m the same way.  So often I react to the world in ways I don’t want to.  It’s the physical part of me eh?   It’s what sin does.  It takes me away from the spiritual, of wanting to obey the law, and brings me into the physical realm.

As Paul says “So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.”   Just like Paul, I have this desire to do what it is right, but I can’t always get myself to do it.  You know what I mean?   Surely you do.   It’s the age old struggle.

Paul’s conclusion is that it the sin in us that it is at fault.   Not my mental outlook, or the spiritual aspect of me wanting to do what is right, but the sin that lives in us.  It’s at fault.
 
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks
be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the
law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
So here you the law.  It’s good and right.
And you know what you find lying right next to it?   SIN!  
It’s right there, ALL THE TIME.  Staring you in the face.  
Causing you to not do what you know you want to do.
Paul sees clearly the wretchedness of it all. The horror of it.  Wanting to do what is right but being unable to.  Like a snapped trap!

But don’t miss it.. I almost did.  Paul DELIGHTS in the law of God within himself.  That delight is there.   And he sees the battle clearly.  The battle between the spiritual and the physical.  The delight vs the captivity.

But look.. there is hope.   
Paul puts it this way.  Thanks
be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the
law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin
We have help.  God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.  He is our help.  No other way through it.  God is our help.   We can serve God with our mind.. sticking to his law.  Our bodies will fight with us being trapped to sin, but With God’s help.. we can still serve him. 

What say you? 

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.  

A commentary I found helpful with this passage>
Amazon.ca: Haldane’s Commentary.  
Amazon.com: Haldane’s Commentary.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

Marriage compared to the Law

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Today we are reading from Romans 7:1-6.

Romans

 Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3 Accordingly, she
will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her
husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law,
and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
Paul continues to talk about our freedom to not be enslaved to sin.  Now he uses the example of marriage and how in a marriage, while our partner lives we need to stick to the bounds of marriage.  BUT if our partner dies, we are free to live as we choose.   Makes sense right?   

 
4 Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.
So just as we have freedom after the death of a spouse, can you see the freedom we have now that Christ freed us from slavery to sin?  The law’s power over us is dead.  We are free!     So though we were living under the power of the flesh, stuck in the law, we don’t have to anymore.   It is dead!   Think about that for a moment.

The drive to sin, that living under the law with it’s penalty of death. It is dead!  

We don’t have to live by that old way.

We have been released from it, able to serve a new way.  That new way is the life of the Spirit.  Life I tell you.  Isn’t it wonderful? 

What say you? 

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites