Great Is Your Mercy — Donnie McClurkin

Great is your mercy towards me
Your love and kind­ness towards me
Your ten­der mercy I see
Day after day
For­ever great­ful towards me
You’ve always pro­vided for me
Great is your mercy I see,
Great is your grace.

Choir:
Great is your mercy towards me
Your love and kind­ness towards me
Your ten­der mercy towards me
Day after day

Your Mercy — Blessed

Con­fes­sion is good for the soul they say
Well now it’s my turn
I’m will­ing to share all I’ve learned some days
But some days not will­ing to learn
I don’t always like to be told, no
What’s right from wrong
I’m self­ish some­times when I don’t wanna be
How can you stand me?
Oh Lord, Why do you hold on?

I’m always talk­ing about the way you bless me
I’m always singing about how good you are
But I don’t always tell, no
That it’s despite of myself
You know I haven’t been good
Some days I don’t do what I should
Yet your mercy some­how endures

There’s no other love that com­pares to yours
It’s hard to under­stand
How you never repay me what I deserve
I thank you that you’re not like man
See some­times I desire to give hurt for hurt
Yet I know that’s not like you
Yet this old flesh of mine tries to win every time
I’m grate­ful your word is true
You faith­fully see me through, oh

I’m always talk­ing about the way you bless me
I’m always singing about how good you are
But I don’t always tell, no
That it’s despite of myself
You know I haven’t been good
Some days I don’t do what I should
Yet your mercy some­how endures

Your mercy is good and it’s kind
Your mercy is brand new every day
Your mercy is ever­last­ing
Your mercy

I’m always talk­ing about the way you bless me
I’m always singing about how good you are
But I don’t always tell, no
That it’s despite of myself
You know I haven’t been good
Some days I don’t do what I should
Yet your mercy some­how endures

Perfect Praise

Oh Lord How excel­lent! How excel­lent! How excel­lent!
How excel­lent is Thy name!

There is none like you, none like you, none like you
Jesus excel­lent is Thy name!

(Tenors) In all the Earth (3x)
All: Jesus excel­lent is Thy name

(Altos) In all the Earth (3x)
All: Jesus excel­lent is Thy name

(Sopra­nos) Every knee shall bow and every tongue con­fess that He is Lord
All: Jesus excel­lent is Thy name 

That’s When You Bless Me — L. A. Mass Choir

My life was torn beyond repair
I felt so alone, seemed no one cared
You came along, gave me a song
To ease the pain and erase the strain

You could have left me stand­ing there
With no one, no one to care
But You promised me You’d be there on time
And You did just what You said

Against all odds, I made the choice
To give You my life, now I rejoice
You answered my prayers not a moment to soon
Your word I embraced, my sins you erased

You could have left me stand­ing there
With no one, no one to care
But You promised me You’d be there on time
And You did just what You said

(I gave it up)
That’s when You bless me
(I let it go)
That’s when You bless me
(Lord, You brought me through, now I’m brand new)

Yes
(I said, have your way)
That’s when You bless me
(Come in to stay)
That’s when You bless me
(Lord, You promised me You would hear my plea)
And You did just what You said.

That Name — Yolanda Adams

There is a name that is so pre­cious,
a name so won­der­ful to me.
This name is wor­thy of all praises.
Because of him, I am made free.
That name is Jesus, oh how I love him.
The one who gave, his life for me.
Because of love, so uncon­di­tional,
I will have life, eter­nally.

This name speaks peace, unto my storm clouds,
This name speaks calm, unto my fears.
And when I feel, that no one loves me.
His lov­ing pres­ence is so near.
That name is Jesus, oh how I love him.
The one who gave, his life for me.
Because of love, so uncon­di­tional,
I will have life, eter­nally.

Praise that name!
Praise that name!
Praise that name!
Praise that name!

Some­day I’ll leave this earthly dwelling,
Through time and space, my soul will soar.
And finally see the face of Jesus.
And praise his name, forever­more!
That name is Jesus, oh how I love him!
The one who gave his life for me!
Because of love so uncon­di­tional,
I will have life eter­nally.

Excel­lent is that name!
Glo­ri­ous is that name!
Won­der­ful is that name!
Oh praise that name!

You are God Alone — Marvin Sapp

There’s no ques­tion of Your great­ness,
no search­ing of Your power.
All the won­der of Your glory,
to You forty years is but one hour.
Your knowl­edge is all encom­pass­ing,
to Your wis­dom there is no end;
for You alone are God,
You are God alone.

Your mercy is ever­last­ing,
Your truth is here always.
You are He who was and is, and is to come.
Who is He that can num­ber you day,
You’ve flung the sun to burn in space,
and the night’s moon pow­ers light from day;
You are God alone.

Now unto the King,
eter­nal, immor­tal, invis­i­ble,
the only wise God,
the only wise God;
You alone are God,
for You are God alone.

Be all glory and honor,
domin­ion, and power
for­ever and ever, amen.

For You alone are God,
You are God alone 

Knowing God, Chapter One — The Study of God

Cur­rent Mood: Happy

I’ve had this book for YEARS, and I’ve never made it all the way through. That’s not the fault of the author; I just have ADD when it comes to books, espe­cially the­o­log­i­cal ones. I read some of this, some of that and then back to some of this. As I’ll be going back to school this fall, I’m try­ing to dis­ci­pline myself as far as read­ing and Bible study go. So here I am, start­ing this excel­lent book again.

In Chap­ter one, Packer estab­lishes that the study of God is CRUCIAL for every­one:

Know­ing about God is cru­cially impor­tant for the liv­ing of our lives.….we are cruel to our­selves if we try to live in the world with­out know­ing about the God whose world it is and who runs it. Dis­re­gard the study of God and you sen­tence your­self to stum­ble and blun­der through life blind­folded, as it were, with no sense of direc­tion and no under­stand­ing of what sur­rounds you. This way you can waste your life and lose your soul.

He then pro­vides five basic truths that Chris­tians know about God as a guide on our jour­ney of study­ing God:

1. God has spo­ken to man, and the Bible is his Word, given to us to make us wise unto sal­va­tion.

2. God is Lord and King over his world; he rules all things for his own glory, dis­play­ing his per­fec­tions in all that he does, in order that men and angels may wor­ship and adore him.

3. God is Sav­ior, active in sov­er­eign love through the Lord Jesus Christ to res­cue believ­ers from the guilt and power of sin, to adopt them as his chil­dren and to bless them accord­ingly.

4. God is tri­une; there are within the God­head three per­sons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and the work of sal­va­tion is one in which all three act together, the Father pur­pos­ing redemp­tion, the Son secur­ing it, and the Spirit apply­ing it.

5. God­li­ness means respond­ing to God’s rev­e­la­tion in trust and obe­di­ence, faith and wor­ship, prayer and praise, sub­mis­sion and ser­vice. Life must be seen and lived in light of God’s Word. This, and noth­ing else, is true reli­gion.

He then goes on to inform the reader of the themes that this jour­ney will con­sist of:

The God­head of God: the qual­i­ties of deity which set God apart from humans and mark the dif­fer­ence and dis­tance between the Cre­ator and his crea­tures. Such qual­i­ti­ties as his self-self exis­tence, his infin­ity, his eter­nity, his unchange­able­ness.

The pow­ers of God: His almight­i­ness, his omni­science, his omnipres­ence.

The per­fec­tions of God, the aspects of his moral charc­ter which are man­i­fested in his words and deeds — his holi­ness, his love and mercy, his truth­ful­ness, his faith­ful­ness, his good­ness, his patience, his jus­tice. We shall have to take note of what pleases him, what offends him, what awak­ens his wrath, what affords him sat­is­fac­tion and joy.

He then says that we need to stop and ask our­selves a “very fun­da­men­tal” ques­tion before going fur­ther: What is my ulti­mate aim and object in occu­py­ing my mind with these things? What do I intend to do with my knowl­edge about God, once I have it?

The point of the ques­tion is for us to really exam­ine our­selves and think about WHY we’re embark­ing on this study. Is it because we want to gain knowl­edge and look down on other who don’t have such knowl­edge? Or is it because we truly want to know and enjoy God for our­selves, so that we may respond to it and CONFORM our lives to it?

I sat for a few min­utes and really thought about the ques­tion. Hon­esty, yes, I DO want to study to be smarter than other peo­ple. I like being smart. But being smart about God does noth­ing for me per­son­ally, unless I APPLY it to my life and desire to live accord­ing to His word. That’s my ulti­mate goal: To learn all I can about the God who cre­ated me, and in so doing, become the per­son he cre­ated me to be. Any other rea­son is truly a waste of time.

Lastly, Packer talks about med­i­tat­ing on the truth. I know when I think of med­i­tat­ing, I think of yoga, gurus, so-called spir­i­tual enlight­en­ment, and a whole host of other unbib­li­cal things. But that’s not what he means here. He defines med­i­ta­tion as:

.…the activ­ity of call­ing to mind, and think­ing over, and dwelling on, and apply­ing to one­self, the var­i­ous things that one knows abou the works and ways and pur­poses and promises of God. It is an activ­ity of holy thought, con­sciously per­formed in the pres­ence of God, under the eye of God, as a means of com­mu­nion with God. 

Its pur­pose is to clear one’s men­tal and spir­i­tual vision of God, and to let his truth make its full and proper impact on one’s mind and heart. It is a mat­ter of talk­ing to one­self about God and one­self; it is, indeed, often a mat­ter of argu­ing with one­self, rea­son­ing one­self out of moods of doubt and unbe­lief into a clear appre­hen­sion of God’s power and grace.

Its effect is ever to hum­ble us, as we con­tem­plate God’s great­ness and glory and our own lit­tle­ness and sin­ful­ness, and to encour­age and reas­sure us.…as we con­tem­plate the unsearch­able riches of divine mercy dis­played in the Lord Jesus Christ.

THAT kind of med­i­ta­tion I can DO! 

The last sen­tence of the chap­ter says:

God help us, then, to put our knowl­edge about God to this use, that we all may in truth “know the Lord.”

AMEN!

Cal​.vini​.st + Anniversary = Giveaway!

Cur­rent Mood: Esctatic

Cal​.vini​.st is cel­e­brat­ing its first anniver­sary by giv­ing away 2 copies of Bible­works 8! Check it out here!