Goldsmiths make exquisite forms from precious material: they fashion the bracelet and the ring from gold. But God makes His precious things out of base material.
From the black pebbles of muddy streams He has taken up stones, which He has set in the golden ring of His unchanging love, to make them gems that sparkle on His finger forever.
✦ Black Pebbles — Sparkling Gems
The goldsmith needs precious material. God does not. He takes what the world discards — black pebbles from muddy streams — and sets them in the ring of His unchanging love. Not gold refined into gold. Mud transformed into gems. The material is base. The hand is divine. And the result sparkles on His finger forever.
Guyon's day twenty-eight — God formed man of the dust of the earth, that he might not rob God of His glory. And Spurgeon today: black pebbles from muddy streams. The same dust. The same mud. The same God who makes precious things from what the world calls worthless. 🙏
I have been extremely busy with our packing to move. I have not been closer to God as I am now. He will not let me go when I do the same.
What a friend we have in the Lord. 🙏
✦ Closest in the Busiest
Guyon's day thirty-one — we are often more united to God in our daily avocations than in retirement. And Le today, in the middle of packing — hands full of tape and cardboard — confirms it from experience: I have not been closer to God as I am now.
The packing is not pulling her away from God. It is the place where He holds her closest — because the Father holds most tightly when the hands are busiest and the exposure is greatest. The testing season is not the absence of God. It is the nearness of God — proved by the work, confirmed by the closeness, sealed by the holding.
He will not let me go when I do the same. The holding is mutual. Le holds onto God. God holds onto Le. And neither lets go. What a friend we have in the Lord. The old hymn. The simplest truth. The friend who does not release when the hands are full and the days are hard. 🙏
"I have not been closer to God as I am now. He will not let me go when I do the same."
Le · The mutual holding · Closest in the busiest · What a friendThe love of the Church extends beyond the person of the Bridegroom and reaches to everything connected with Him. There is not a word His lips have spoken, nor a place where His feet have walked, nor a vessel His hands have held, that is not wholly sacred in her eyes.
His written Word, over which we even now see that loving hand moving as it did when, long ago, it wrote each line. The echo of His voice, not yet buried in silence. His communion cup, not yet empty. His blood still flowing, and His blessing still breathing peace upon us.
✦ Everything Connected to Him
The love extends to everything connected with Christ. His Word — the loving hand still moving across each line. His voice — the echo not yet buried. His cup — not yet empty. His blood — still flowing. His blessing — still breathing peace.
These are Le's mornings. The written Word read before dawn. The echo of His voice heard in the meditation. The communion cup shared in the quiet. Every morning is a memorial of Jesus — not a relic hoarded, but a living encounter continued. 🙏
As for His people, we greet them as saints, we call them our brothers and sisters. The humblest beggar in His Church is of more importance to us than the proudest monarch outside it.
"Because he belongs to Christ" is always a sufficient reason for the outpouring of our love, for all that is His is dear to us.
Because he belongs to Christ — a sufficient reason for love. No other qualification needed. No résumé. No credentials. No explanation. Belonging to Christ is enough. And the love that flows from this belonging does not measure the exterior — it recognizes the interior. Guyon's day twenty-four: I do not regard the exterior, but the state of the soul. Spurgeon and Guyon — seeing the same way, loving the same way. 🙏
The Lord's Jewels
Black pebbles from muddy streams, set in the ring of His unchanging love. The goldsmith needs gold. God needs only mud. Base material — sparkling forever on His finger.
The Mutual Holding
He will not let me go when I do the same. Closest to God in the busiest season. The packing is not distance — it is nearness. What a friend we have in the Lord.
Memorials of Jesus
His Word — the hand still moving. His voice — the echo not buried. His cup — not empty. His blood — still flowing. Every morning a living encounter, not a relic hoarded.
Spurgeon's twelfth day. And today the base material sparkles — and the busiest hands are the closest to God.
Guyon's day twenty-eight — dust and breath: "God formed man of the dust of the earth, that he might not rob God of His glory." And Spurgeon: from the black pebbles of muddy streams He makes gems that sparkle forever. The same dust. The same mud. The same God who needs nothing precious to make something precious.
Guyon's day thirty-one — daily avocations: "We are often more united to God in our daily avocations than in retirement." And Le today: I have not been closer to God as I am now. Confirmed. In the packing. In the tape and cardboard. In the busiest season of the year. The avocation is the avenue of closeness.
The mutual holding: He will not let me go when I do the same. Song of Solomon 3:4 — I held him and would not let him go. The bride's grip and the Bridegroom's grip — mutual, simultaneous, unbreakable. Le holds onto God in the packing season. God holds onto Le in the testing season. And neither lets go.
The 500 denari soul — base material, sparkling gem: A black pebble from a muddy stream. Midnight in Lubbock. The base material that no goldsmith would have chosen. But God picked it up, set it in the ring of His unchanging love, and it sparkles on His finger still. The Beloved Devotional Journal is the sparkle — the evidence that the base material was transformed. Not by the material's effort. By the Jeweler's hand. 🙏