Sabbath Day Lesson

In Genesis, the world was made;

In Exodus, the march is told;

Leviticus contains the Law;

In Numbers are the tribes enrolled.

In Deuteronomy again,

We're urged to keep God's law alone;

And these five Books of Moses make

The oldest holy writing known.

Brave Joshua to Canaan leads;

In Judges, oft the Jews rebel;

We read of David's name in Ruth

And First and Second Samuel.

In First and Second Kings we read

How bad the Hebrew state became;

In First and Second Chronicles

Another history of the same.

In Ezra, captive Jews return,

And Nehemiah builds the wall;

Queen Esther saves her race from death,

These books "Historical" we call.

In Job we read of patient faith;

In Psalms are David's songs of praise;

The Proverbs are to make us wise;

Ecclesiastes next portrays,

How fleeting earthly pleasures are;

The Song of Solomon is all

About true love, like Christ's and these

Five books "Devotional" we call.

Isaiah tells of Christ to come,

While Jeremiah tells of woe,

And his Lamentations mourns

The Holy City's overthrow.

Ezekiel speaks of mysteries;

And Daniel foretells kings of old;

Hosea over Israel grieves;

In Joel blessings are foretold.

In Amos too, are Israel's woes;

And Obadiah's sent to warn;

While Jonah shows that Christ should die

And Micah where he should be born.

In Nahum Nineveh is seen;

Habakkuk tells of Chaldea's guilt;

In Zephaniah are Judah's sins;

In Haggai the Temple's built.

Then Zechariah speaks of Christ,

And Malachi of John, his sign;

The Prophets number seventeen,

And all the books are thirty-nine.

Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John

Tell what Christ did in every place;

The Acts tell what the Apostles did,

And Romans how we're saved by grace.

Corinthians instruct the Church;

Galatians show us faith alone;

Ephesians, true love, and in

Philippians God's grace is shown.

Colossians tells us more of Christ,

And Thessalonians of the end;

In Timothy and Titus both

Are rules for pastors to attend.

Philemon, Christian friendship shows.

Then Hebrews clearly tell how all

The Jewish law prefigured Christ;

And these Epistles are by Paul.

James shows that faith by works must live,

And Peter urges steadfastness;

While John exhorts to Christian love,

For those who have it God will bless.

Jude shows the end of evil men,

And Revelation tells of Heaven.

This ends the whole New Testament

And all the books are twenty-seven.

Author Unknown

"Train up children in the way they should go, and in keeping with his or her

individual gift or bent, and when they are old they will not depart from it."

Proverbs 22:6

"Your word is a lamp to my feet

and a light to my path."

Psalm 119:105

Thy Word

Amy Grant

The Path That Leads To Nowhere

Wild Springtime Violets became the

 official State Flower of New Jersey in 1971

There's a path that leads to Nowhere

In a meadow that I know,

Where an inland river rises

And the stream is still and slow;

There it wanders under the willows

And beneath the silver green

Of the birches' silent shadows

Where the early violets lean.

Other pathways lead to Somewhere,

But the one I love so well

Has no end and no beginning-

Just the beauty of the dell,

Just the windflowers and the lilies

Yellow striped as adder's tongue'

Seem to satisfy my pathway

as it winds their sweets among.

There I go to meet the Springtime,

Where the meadow is aglow,

Marigolds amid the marshes,

And the stream is still and slow;

There I find my fair oasis,

And with carefree feet I tread

For the pathway leads to Nowhere,

And the blue is overhead.

All the ways that lead to Somewhere

Echo with the hurrying feet

Of the Struggling and the Striving,

But the way I find so sweet

Bids me dream and bids me linger-

Joy and Beauty are its goal;

On the path that leads to Nowhere

I have sometimes found my soul.

Corinne Roosevelt Robinson

Wildflowers of the Meadow

Hunterdon County, New Jersey

And Fair The Form Of Music Shines

"To thee I'll return, overburdened with care
The heart's dearest solace will smile on me there
No more from that cottage again will I roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home."
John Howard Payne

Two armies covered hill and plain,

Where Rappahannock's waters

Ran deeply crimsoned with the stain

Of battles recent slaughters.

The summer clouds lay pitched like tents

In meads of heavenly azure;

And each dread gun of the elements

Slept in its high embrasure.

The breeze so softly blew, it made

No forest leaf to quiver;

And the smoke of the random cannonade

Rolled slowly from the river.

And now where circling hills look down

With cannon grimly planted,

O'er listless camp and silent town

The golden sunset slanted.

When on the fervid air there came

A strain now rich now tender;

The music seemed itself aflame

With day's departing splendor.

A Federal band which eve and morn

Played measures brave and nimble,

Had just struck up with flute and horn

And lively clash of cymbal.

Down flocked the soldiers to the banks;

Till, margined by its pebbles,

One wooded shore was blue with "Yanks"

And one was gray with "Rebels".

Then all was still; and then the band,

With movement light and tricksy,

Made stream and forest, hill and strand

Reverberate with "Dixie".

The conscious stream, with burnished glow,

Went proudly o'er its pebbles,

But thrilled throughout its deepest flow

With yelling of the Rebels.

Again a pause; and then again

The trumpet pealed sonorous,

And "Yankee Doodle" was the strain

To which the shore gave chorus.

The laughing ripple shoreward flew

To kiss the shining pebbles;

Loud shrieked the swarming Boys in blue

Defiance to the Rebels.

And yet once more the bugle sang

Above the stormy riot;

No shout upon the evening rang-

There reigned a holy quiet.

The sad, slow stream its noiseless flood

Poured o'er the glistening pebbles;

All silent now the Yankees stood,

All silent stood the Rebels.

No unresponsive soul had heard

That plaintive note's appealing,

So deeply, "Home Sweet Home" had stirred

The hidden fonts of feeling.

Or Blue, or Gray, the soldier sees

As by the wand of fairy,

The cottage 'neath the live oak trees,

The cabin by the prairie.

Tho' cold or warm, his native skies

bend in their beauty o'er him;

Seen through the tear mist in his eyes,

His loved ones stand before him.

As fades the iris after rain

In April's tearful weather,

The vision vanished as the strain

And daylight died together.

But Memory, waked by Music's art,

Expressed in simple numbers,

Subdued the sternest Yankee's heart,

Made light the Rebel's slumbers.

And fair the form of Music shines-

The bright celestial creature-

Who still 'mid War's embattled lines

Gives this one touch of Nature.

"Music In Camp"

John R. Thompson

Rappahannock River

Virginia

Paul Revere's Ride

The Old North Church

Listen, my children, and you shall hear

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,

On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-Five;

Hardly a man is now alive

Who remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend,

"If the British march

By land or sea from the town tonight,

Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch

Of the North Church tower as a signal light,

One, if by land, and two, if by sea;

And I on the opposite shore will be,

Ready to ride and spread the alarm

Through every Middlesex village and farm,

For the country folks to be up and to arm."

Then he said, "Good Night" and with a muffled oar

Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore,

Just as the moon rose over the bay,

Where swinging wide at her moorings lay

The Somerset, British man-of-war;

A phantom ship, with each mast and spar

Across the moon like a prison bar,

And a huge black hulk, that was magnified

By its own reflection in the tide.

Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street,

Wanders and watches with eager ears,

Till in the silence around him he hears

The muster of men at the barrack door

The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet,

And the measured tread of the grenadiers,

Marching down to their boats on the shore.

Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church,

By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread,

To the belfry-chamber overhead,

And startled the pigeons from their perch

On the somber rafters, that round him made

Masses and moving shapes of shade,-

By the trembling ladder, steep and tall,

To the highest window in the wall,

Where he paused to listen and look down

A moment on the roofs of the town

And the moonlight flowing over all.

Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead,

In their night-encampment on the hill,

Wrapped in silence so deep and still

That he could hear, like the sentinel's tread,

The watchful night-wind, as it went

Creeping along from tent to tent,

And seeming to whisper, "All is well!"

A moment only he feels the spell

Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread

Of lonely belfry and the dead;

For suddenly all his thoughts are bent

On a shadowy something far away,

Where the river widens to meet the bay,

A line of black that bends and floats

On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats.

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride,

Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride

On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.

Now he patted his horse's side,

Now gazed at the landscape far and near,

Then, impetuous, stamped the earth,

And turned and tightened his saddle-girth;

But mostly he watched with eager search,

The belfry-tower of the Old North Church,

As it rose above the graves on the hill,

Lonely and spectral and somber and still.

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height

A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!

He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,

But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight

A second lamp in the belfry burns!

A hurry of hoofs in a village street,

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark,

And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark

Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet;

That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light

The fate of a nation was riding that night;

And the spark struck out by that steed in his flight,

Kindled the land into flame with its heat.

He left the village and mounted the steep,

And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep,

Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides;

And under the alders, that skirt its edge,

Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge,

Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.

It was twelve by the village clock

When he crossed the bridge into Medford town.

He heard the crowing of the cock,

And the barking of the farmer's dog,

And felt the damp of the river's fog,

That rises after the sun goes down.

It was one by the village clock,

When he galloped into Lexington.

He saw the gilded weathercock

Swim in the moonlight as he passed,

And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare,

Gaze at him with a spectral glare,

As if they already stood aghast

At the bloody work they would look upon. 

It was two by the village clock,

When he came to the bridge in Concord town.

He heard the bleating of the flock,

And the twitter of birds among the trees,

And felt the breath of the morning breeze

Blowing over the meadows brown.

And one was safe and asleep in his bed

Who at the bridge would be first to fall,

Who that day would be lying dead,

Pierced by a British musket-ball.

You know the rest. In the books you have read,

How the British Regulars fired and fled,-

How the farmers gave them ball for ball,

From behind each fence and farmyard wall,

Chasing the redcoats down the lane,

Then crossing the fields to emerge again

Under the trees at the turn of the road,

And only pausing to fire and load.

So through the night rode Paul Revere;

And so through the night went his cry of alarm

To every Middlesex village and farm,-

A cry of defiance, and not of fear,

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,

And a word that shall echo forevermore!

For, borne on the night wind of the Past,

Through all our history, to the last,

In the hour of darkness and peril and need,

The people will waken and listen to hear

The hurrying hoofbeats of that stead,

And the midnight message of  Paul Revere

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Paul Revere's Ride

NC Wyeth

But An Eagle Soars Alone

"Look carefully how you walk!

Live purposefully and worthily and accurately,

not as unwise and witless,

but as wise, sensible, intelligent people."

Ephesians 5:15

     "Basically, there are two ways of getting things: 

One is receiving and one is grabbing.

 A lot of people get things by grabbing,

 but the trouble with grabbing is

 what you get is not permanent. 

You can have it for a while,

 but ultimately it will not be yours.

 The other way to get things is to receive.

 To receive what God has for you.

 And in the long run, you are not going

 to have more than you receive from God.

     The only thing that’s permanent in your life

 or in mine is that which we receive from God. 

So why don’t you stop grabbing for awhile.

 Stop grasping, stop trying to get,

 and just turn to God and say,

 “God, whatever You want me to have, that’s what I want.

 I’ll be satisfied. I will not go after that big position

 or that large sum of money

 or that particular form of pleasure unless, 

God, I can receive it from You.” 

Because what you receive from God will bless you.

 It will be truly yours.

 It will be permanent.

 It will not do you harm in the end. 

 Whereas the things you get by grasping 

often, in the long run,

 you’ll be sorry you ever reached for them

 and grasped them.

 So remember the secure things,

 the things that bring peace

 and real blessings,

 are the things that you received

 from heaven and from God.

 -Derek Prince 

 The blessings of Springtime

Sweet lilacs in bloom

These simple words, commonly heard,

Bring hope to those storm-tossed, windblown:

"Birds of a feather flock together,

But an eagle soars alone."

Content to fly a solitary high

I come by myself to God's throne;

Receiving His peace, the spirit's release,

Where His amazing love is shown.

To hear more clearly, follow more nearly,

I seek man's approval no more;

It's important to trust, by faith I must,

Eager to see what's in store.

Every new day, I learn to obey,

His friendship's my only desire;

It's Jesus and me, for eternity,

By His grace alone, I'll fly higher."

 "Flight"
Elaine Hardt

Flying American Bald Eagle
Walt Curlee




"But those who wait for the Lord
shall renew their strength;
they shall lift their wings
and mount up close to God 
as eagles mount up to the sun;
they shall run and not be weary,
they shall walk, and not faint."
Isaiah 40:31