I've posted about the Tenth Avenue North song "By Your Side" previously (1st By Your Side post) but God has been really laying it on my heart to write again but in a different way. Previously I was more looking at the first verse of the song rather than the chorus. Now the chorus is really stuck in my head... day after day.
CHORUS:
And I'll be by your side
Wherever you fall
In the dead of night
Whenever you call
And please don't fight
These hands that are holding you
My hands are holding you
Confession: I have been having a terrible time sleeping lately. I know there are many reasons why this could be happening from depression to anxiety to stress to hormones and beyond. It is probably mostly stress but still... it's really hard when you've moved back into insomnia and it won't release you for one full 8-hour peacefulness. I have been fighting it and it keeps winning. One morning the radio woke me up with By Your Side playing and when I couldn't get it out of my head, I found it on YouTube and played it again. Then I turned on Pandora and typed in Tenth Avenue North and it was the first thing that came up. This morning when I turned on Pandora, By Your Side started playing again... and then again tonight, after an incredible Bible Study, I turned on my radio in my car and guess what was playing... yup, By Your Side. This song keeps coming out of nowhere and it's not the first verse, as I said, this time. It's that chorus. The words that stand out are 'please don't fight these hands that are holding you.' His hands are holding me. He has 'hemmed' me in.
This evening in Bible Study we did the Lectio Divina (divine reading) with Psalm 139. I must make another confession, I do not sit still very well nor can I focus on one task at a time normally. The first time she read this passage the words that stood out to me were 'hemmed me in' and 'anxious thoughts'. I started meditating on anxious thoughts. I then heard 'fearfully and wonderfully made' and kept thinking of those three phrases. The last time, I really listened to the whole passage and found myself amazed that God really knew me and knew EVERY day that I had - every miniscule thing that I did. He knew how badly I'd mess up in life and still, He created me. He knew that I would fall away from Him time and time again but STILL created me. He allowed me to be on this earth and now that I really truly see that with honestly open eyes, I want to make sure the rest of my life blesses Him as much as He has allowed me the right to walk this earth.
He is by my side wherever I am. He knows when I get up and when I lay down. He knows my words before I even THINK them. As much as I strive for something great, I can never even understand who He is. I will never 'get it'. He is with me no matter where I am, what I am doing, who I am with, what I am thinking or speaking. He is there. He loves me that much.
One of the women in the study said: "All of us want someone to understand us and to love us... how incredible that He knows us inside and out and still loves us!" He is with us throughout every day, even when we do bad things. It says "If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go to hell, you are there." I don't think I ever thought of that. He is wherever we go. We're told this as children to shame us into not doing anything bad but as we grow older, we realize that it's a comfort not something to be ashamed of. He knows all the things we do and loves us anyway. We can't always say that about ourselves or those who love us. We find out that someone has done bad things and cast judgment on them. We hurt other people and they stop loving us.
This has really shown me that if a God who knows EVERYTHING about us can love us, why... WHY can't we just love other people without judgment, blame, hatred or anger? Why do we feel that we can judge others when the God that is by our sides at all times doesn't judge us? It goes back to removing the plank from our own eye before helping someone else with the sawdust in theirs. Do we have any right to do that when we are just as much to blame for private sins? Nothing is private to God. It's always scared me but now I need to learn that it's really a comfort. He loves us enough to 'hem us in' on all sides. He loves us enough to be with us in hell and sing praises with us in heaven.
He is God. He is God alone. Let's just start being human and let God take care of judgment. Love as He loves and live as He has asked.
CHORUS:
And I'll be by your side
Wherever you fall
In the dead of night
Whenever you call
And please don't fight
These hands that are holding you
My hands are holding you
Confession: I have been having a terrible time sleeping lately. I know there are many reasons why this could be happening from depression to anxiety to stress to hormones and beyond. It is probably mostly stress but still... it's really hard when you've moved back into insomnia and it won't release you for one full 8-hour peacefulness. I have been fighting it and it keeps winning. One morning the radio woke me up with By Your Side playing and when I couldn't get it out of my head, I found it on YouTube and played it again. Then I turned on Pandora and typed in Tenth Avenue North and it was the first thing that came up. This morning when I turned on Pandora, By Your Side started playing again... and then again tonight, after an incredible Bible Study, I turned on my radio in my car and guess what was playing... yup, By Your Side. This song keeps coming out of nowhere and it's not the first verse, as I said, this time. It's that chorus. The words that stand out are 'please don't fight these hands that are holding you.' His hands are holding me. He has 'hemmed' me in.
This evening in Bible Study we did the Lectio Divina (divine reading) with Psalm 139. I must make another confession, I do not sit still very well nor can I focus on one task at a time normally. The first time she read this passage the words that stood out to me were 'hemmed me in' and 'anxious thoughts'. I started meditating on anxious thoughts. I then heard 'fearfully and wonderfully made' and kept thinking of those three phrases. The last time, I really listened to the whole passage and found myself amazed that God really knew me and knew EVERY day that I had - every miniscule thing that I did. He knew how badly I'd mess up in life and still, He created me. He knew that I would fall away from Him time and time again but STILL created me. He allowed me to be on this earth and now that I really truly see that with honestly open eyes, I want to make sure the rest of my life blesses Him as much as He has allowed me the right to walk this earth.
He is by my side wherever I am. He knows when I get up and when I lay down. He knows my words before I even THINK them. As much as I strive for something great, I can never even understand who He is. I will never 'get it'. He is with me no matter where I am, what I am doing, who I am with, what I am thinking or speaking. He is there. He loves me that much.
One of the women in the study said: "All of us want someone to understand us and to love us... how incredible that He knows us inside and out and still loves us!" He is with us throughout every day, even when we do bad things. It says "If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go to hell, you are there." I don't think I ever thought of that. He is wherever we go. We're told this as children to shame us into not doing anything bad but as we grow older, we realize that it's a comfort not something to be ashamed of. He knows all the things we do and loves us anyway. We can't always say that about ourselves or those who love us. We find out that someone has done bad things and cast judgment on them. We hurt other people and they stop loving us.
This has really shown me that if a God who knows EVERYTHING about us can love us, why... WHY can't we just love other people without judgment, blame, hatred or anger? Why do we feel that we can judge others when the God that is by our sides at all times doesn't judge us? It goes back to removing the plank from our own eye before helping someone else with the sawdust in theirs. Do we have any right to do that when we are just as much to blame for private sins? Nothing is private to God. It's always scared me but now I need to learn that it's really a comfort. He loves us enough to 'hem us in' on all sides. He loves us enough to be with us in hell and sing praises with us in heaven.
He is God. He is God alone. Let's just start being human and let God take care of judgment. Love as He loves and live as He has asked.
