Dec 16 - Psalm 23:4c

thy rod and thy staff

they comfort me

Psalm 23:4c

 

We were refugees once. A wildfire was sweeping into our town. An entire city was evacuated. Mary Louise called the only person she knew in the next town over. An acquaintance from many years before. “Come,” she said graciously when she heard Mary Louise’s voice.

 

From childhood, Naomi had led a life very different than ours. And for our week of evacuation, she watched Mary Louise with our children. She saw the passionate, tender love. But she also saw something she didn’t experience in her own upbringing – steady, firm, consistent discipline.

 

At the end of the week, she said to Mary Louise, “I envy your children. My mother wanted to be my friend, so she let me do whatever I wanted. There were no rules. No boundaries. And I never felt loved. I never felt like my mother cared enough to say, ‘No.’”

 

Can you trustingly say to our loving Shepherd, “Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

 

In Christ’s Love,

a guy who keeps witnessing

the benefits of both law and gospel,

love and discipline