Singing an old well known song at church today, I started to think how some of the lyrics were just *so* irrelevant to me\u2026\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I look down from lofty mountain grandeur\u2026\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Seriously? Here I am in church, wearing thongs, in hot, desert-like, flat and featureless WA and I am singing about \u2018mountains\u2019?? And what exactly is grandeur exactly?\u00a0<\/p>\n
I think about a time when I was at the highest peak in WA. And then about different *actual* mountains in Switzerland or volcanoes in Tenerife I have visited…<\/p>\n
They were amazing – picturesque – powerful scenes. But here, singing this song, those scenes mean *nothing*. It is not the \u2018extravagant\u2019 what comes to mind and causes me to worship – it is the things *far* more \u2018mundane’ and valuable\u2026\u00a0<\/p>\n
The many days where I really can\u2019t handle the pain – where death seems so attractive, the days I don\u2019t have the strength or capability to be all I want to be for my wife. The many days I don\u2019t have the answers for my children or the ability to play \/ wrestle \/ teach or work with my children.<\/p>\n
The many times I can\u2019t fulfil a normal days work or am completely overwhelmed with the pressure of finances, trying to finish the house, run a \u2018business\u2019, catch up on taxes, fix our vehicle\/s, be some kind of witness or achieve *something* for Jesus while completely inadequate…<\/p>\n
In *those* times, when I feel so helpless, less than complete, useless and powerless that Jesus keeps me going. He sustains me and at times gives me this tiny, intimate signs that remind me:<\/p>\n
He is in control
I am not alone, He has not abandoned me
He cares about me.\u00a0\u00a0
He actually loves me and those around me.\u00a0
He has sustained me for 45+ years – through thick and thin, through every valley, through a life lived against Him and His people and through the many innumerable times that I have failed Him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So, so holy. So, so faithful. So so forgiving.\u00a0
But there is more.\u00a0
He brings to mind the fact that if I open my tear filled eyes, I will see my beautiful, faithful, forgiving wife worshipping too.\u00a0<\/p>\n
And if I looked to her side I will see my six incredible children, all wanting to worship and serve this incredible God too. In fact, I can hear them singing – they may be out of tune or time, I wouldn\u2019t know and do not care.<\/p>\n
I know in this moment that if I actually submitted to the overwhelming emotion of all this, the indescribable joy, the unending and immeasurable love – I would collapse in a helpless bundle of tears. I try to keep it at bay – the last thing I want is to be a spectacle or detract people from worshipping this Almighty King.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I have nothing of myself for Him, all I have is a weak, out of tune song:\u00a0<\/p>\n
? \u201cHow great thou art\u201d \u00a0?\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Singing an old well known song at church today, I started to think how some of the lyrics were just *so* irrelevant to me\u2026\u00a0 \u201cWhen I look down from lofty mountain grandeur\u2026\u201d\u00a0 Seriously? Here I am in church, wearing thongs, in hot, desert-like, flat and featureless WA and I am singing about \u2018mountains\u2019?? And what exactly is grandeur exactly?\u00a0 I think about a time when I was at the highest peak in WA. And then about different *actual* mountains in Switzerland or volcanoes in Tenerife I have visited… They were amazing – picturesque – powerful scenes. But here, singing this …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1834,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[15],"tags":[106],"class_list":["post-1835","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soul-food","tag-worship"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Mountain-Granduer-How-Great-Thou-Art-Jesus-in-King.jpg?fit=1852%2C1350&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pasDCW-tB","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1835","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1835"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1835\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1836,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1835\/revisions\/1836"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1835"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1835"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wildeden.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1835"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}