Victorian Emporium Items

A few new items for the Victorian Emporium in Bastian, VA, now open!

 You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.” Isaiah 26:3

Randomness

Working on a tablecloth takes a lot of time and commitment.  It will, Lord willing, be an heirloom, to be passed down for several generations.  The idea of something that I make outlasting me is a little daunting, but really, isn't our legacy important?  And even more than the work of my hands, I pray that the blessing of loving the Lord will be handed down through my family until the Lord comes back in glory.  Working for the future can be daunting, especially when it seems that my future is simply more of the same - more waiting, more treading water, etc...  But the reality is that the Lord is good, and He is working out His plan in time and space subduing His and our enemies.  So while He cares very much what we are going through, He also loves us enough to want the very best for us, and to teach us and train us, even when it would be so much easier to let us wallow in our sin and misery.  This is the God we serve.  This amazing grace extended to fallen humans allows us to look to God as our Father, rather than only as our Judge.  This is so humbling and amazing.  Pruning is part of growing.  Longing is part of growing.  Learning to rest in the Lord's will while working at the tasks He has given us to do is part of growing. 

2 Timothy 1:12
...which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me. 

Love

1 Corinthians 13

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ³  If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
⁴  Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant ⁵ or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ⁶ it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. ⁷  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
⁸ Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰ but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. ¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. ¹² For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
¹³ So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

 So what is love, biblically defined?  

Love is desiring what is best for others.  Love is behaving humbly and putting others first.  Love seeks God, and obedience to His revealed will, first.  Love bears and forebears.  Love endures.  Love seeks good and godly growth in others.  Love is an action, not a feeling.  Love is something that we cannot do or have apart from the grace of God.
  
These truths are being brought home to me in new ways right now.  The Lord is teaching His stubborn sheep how to be patient and kind and loving to others, even when she doesn't feel like it!  And He is teaching her in such a gentle way.  

Blessings,
Alana

Did you know...

 

...there are more verses to the Doxology?  

Awake, my soul, and with the sun
Thy daily stage of duty run;
Shake off dull sloth, and joyful rise,
To pay thy morning sacrifice.

Lord, I my vows to Thee renew;
Disperse my sins as morning dew.
Guard my first springs of thought and will,
And with Thyself my spirit fill.

Direct, control, suggest, this day,
All I design, or do, or say,
That all my powers, with all their might,
In Thy sole glory may unite.

Praise God, from Whom all blessings flow;
Praise Him, all creatures here below;
Praise Him above, ye heavenly host;
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

~ Thomas Ken