Deal with your servant according to your steadfast love, and teach me your statutes.

To deal with me according to Your steadfast love is to deal with me in justice, mercy, and grace. It is the way I learn obedience to Your statutes, the way I learn to adsorb Your Word into my life.

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 65

Mid-day: 119:137-144

Evening: Psalm 141

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

All this has come upon us, though we have not forgotten you, and we have not been false to your covenant. Our heart has not turned back, nor have our steps departed from your way; (19) yet you have broken us in the place of jackals and covered us with the shadow of death.

Lord, I have to realize that no matter what comes upon me in the way of trial or temptation that You are with me, Your hand never leaves me, Your Spirit never deserts me, I am always secure in Your grace and mercy. I must never forget that You will lead me through the barren places and through the fiery pits.

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 64

Mid-day: 119:129-136

Evening: Psalm 140

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

You have made us the taunt of our neighbors, the derision and scorn of those around us. You have made us a byword among the nations, a laughingstock among the peoples. All day long my disgrace is before me, and shame has covered my face at the sound of the taunter and reviler, at the sight of the enemy and the avenger.

The state of the Church today in this country is a source of derision and scorn by those outside the Church. And it is no wonder when those in leadership live lives of defiance of Your Commandments and Your Word. It is no wonder when professing Christians live lives that are identical in purpose to those around them. It is no wonder when the Church focuses upon management and marketing practices drawn form the world to advance its mission. It is no wonder when that mission is defined by the same standards as the world about is, standards of membership and attendance. When will we drop to our knees and cry out to You, “We have sinned in Your eyes, we have not been faithful to our calling, forgive us, O Lord”

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 63

Mid-day: 119:121-128

Evening: Psalm 139

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

But you have rejected us and disgraced us and have not gone out with our armies. You have made us turn back from the foe, and those who hate us have gotten spoil. You have made us like sheep for slaughter and have scattered us among the nations. You have sold your people for a trifle, demanding no high price for them.

You have not rejected Your people, but You have turned Your face from our wicked ways. How can we, those who claim to be followers of You, but yet who disobey You at every turn, continue to demand Your favor? No, You are disciplining Your church and we will pay the penalty for our disobedience. The church in this country is about to go through a purging equivalent to the Babylon exile. Daniel 5:21b “until he knew that the Most High God rules the kingdom of mankind and sets over it whom he will.” (written on 10/19/2012, 18 days before the election of 2012 on 11/6)

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 52

Mid-day: 119:113-120

Evening: Psalm 138

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

You are my King, O God; ordain salvation for Jacob! Through you we push down our foes; through your name we tread down those who rise up against us. For not in my bow do I trust, nor can my sword save me. But you have saved us from our foes and have put to shame those who hate us. In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever. Selah

It is a hard lesson to learn Lord, that I cannot trust in my own strength and wisdom. It is through You I defeat those who rise up against me, the specter of discouragement, the miasma of discontent, the black cloud of depression; all succumb to the power of Your salvation. Praise You, my Lord and Master.

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 61

Mid-day: 119:105-112

Evening: Psalm 137

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

To the choirmaster. A Maskil of the Sons of Korah. O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days, in the days of old: you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted; you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free; for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them.

O, Lord, as the Psalmist says in Psalm 103:17-18, Your promises flow to those in whom You delight. And those are the one who fear You and who seek to obey Your commandments. How can I expect blessings when I am disobedient? No, I must expect correction and discipline, also because You love me and seek to be able to bestow Your blessings upon me.

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 60

Mid-day: 119:97-104

Evening: Psalm 136

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

"And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: 'The words of him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. "'I know your works. You have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God. Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you. Yet you have still a few names in Sardis, people who have not soiled their garments, and they will walk with me in white, for they are worthy. The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'

Remember what we have received, “the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” Jude 3b and repent. When will we learn? When will we be be driven to our knees in shame and with heart rending sobs declare that we have sinned against You in not carrying the Gospel faithfully and in its entirety to the lost?

When am I going to fall to my knees, repenting of those times I have been too cowardly fearing the scorn of men over the wrath of God?

Today's readings in the Psalms:

Morning: Psalm 59

Mid-day: 119:89-96

Evening: Psalm 135

Voices Together is available as an annual daily devotional and can be purchased at the Fellowship Of Ailbe bookstore.

This blessing has fallen to me, that I have kept your precepts.

What a wonderful thought, to realize that obedience is the ultimate blessing. To know that as I obey, an upwelling of gratitude, all the blessings of the Kingdom inure to me. It is upon me to seek that state of gratitude that is expressed in obedience. The goal is not the blessing, it is to be able to tell my Lord how grateful I am that He paid the ransom to bring me into the Kingdom.

Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my sojourning.

Your word is music to my lips and balm to my soul. Peace lies in the constant meditation of Your Law.

Is this the purpose for the fitful sleep lately? Lead me and instruct me, my Lord.

Hot indignation seizes me because of the wicked, who forsake your law.

How can individuals who claim to be believers in You, flaunt Your Law, deliberately and knowingly disobey You? Is it because they really do not believe that You gave all for them, that redemption comes only through the Cross and that they owe all to You? Is it because they really do not understand that living in obedience to the Law is the key to enjoying life in the Kingdom? Or are they unrepentant at heart?

When I think of your rules from of old, I take comfort, O LORD.

From everlasting to everlasting. Your Rule is Truth. Your Rule is constant and wavers not. I know that Your Rule is the same yesterday, today and forever. It is comfort. I know that I can turn to it today and that it will be there tomorrow.

The insolent utterly deride me, but I do not turn away from your law.

It is amazing how those who refuse Your offer of grace and mercy laugh at me for admitting my weakness and need for Your love; how they ridicule me for relying on Your Word for guidance for my life. Yet they stumble and fall, they suffer from the fruit of sin and do not see it. You offer righteousness, peace and joy, they chose corruption, turmoil and fear.