All I Have Needed

Great is Thy faithfulness
Great is Thy faithfulness
Morning by morning new mercies I see
And all I have needed Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy faithfulness
Lord unto me

'Great Is Thy Faithfulness' (second verse)   Thomas Chisholm/W M Runyan

Breadboard at Dove Cottage - April 2020

photography by Gill Stewart

Val sent this encouragement at the weekend: Not all of us can do great things; but we can do a little with great love. The love of God is a great love and without Him, we can only love. All that is good and great in us comes from the Almighty. There are many things that we call great, which in reality are nothing of the sort in comparison with Him.

Val's thought inspired recollection of the famous hymn Great Is Thy Faithfulness. There is no shadow of turning with Thee. He is ever faithful, ever sure, to borrow a line from another hymn. And the sureness of His faithfulness toward us is what gives us the security we crave; it inspires trust in Him for all that we need. Not what we want; but what we need - and only He fully knows what we need.

In March - before the lockdown - we went to a healing retreat run by Ellel Ministries. We both went there with our idea of what each of us wanted in the way of healing and restoration. The beauty of that retreat was how the faithfulness of the ministry team in hearing from the Holy Spirit, were able to discern what we needed ... and that, in turn, provided a large measure of what we wanted. All I have needed Thy hand hath provided. If The Lord had given us only what we wanted, the healing would have been merely superficial. The Lord's way is deeper and lasts, if we walk it out, so that now, morning by morning new mercies I see.

His way is truth and brings life. Great is Thy faithfulness Lord unto me.

Chris Rice singing 'Great Is Thy Faithfulness'