No resting place

candle image

‘No resting place’

This ugly-beautiful world

wanted no part

of the dawning wonder

for human hearts

Preferring to rage cold

against the Light

Preferring their own darkness

instead of sight

Hope of glory, Hope of grace

the angels sang

While freed from Mary’s womb Your

earthly life began

No glory crown, no resting place

or kingly bed

But cross and nails and pain

ran berry-red

Death and resurrection

to the skies

Comfort of Your Presence in

Holy Spirit sighs

How blind, how hateful, how cruel

mankind can be

While You offer Love, Joy, Peace

to set us free

©JoyLenton2014

no resting place PJ poem pin file image

Come to Him

advent WoJ file image

‘Come’

Come to the manger

Come empty

Come dry

You have no need

God cannot supply

Come see the Christ-child

Come wonder

Come kneel

Open your heart

and God will reveal

Come hear the angels

Come listen

Come bring

Your awe, amazement

as heaven’s hosts sing

Come witness Mary

Come ponder

Come pray

Her tender devotions

will show you the way

Come away slowly

Come Hope-filled

Come changed

As you give God your life

it becomes rearranged

©JoyLenton2014

**Unless God indicates otherwise, I am taking a brief blogging break to contemplate more closely the wonder of Christ’s coming to earth, to savour the season and spend quality time with my family. It is my hope and prayer to return early in January to share the words He lays on my heart, including the One Word 365 for 2015.**

I’d like to wish my dear readers and followers a very ‘Merry Christmas’ and a ‘Happy New Year’! Thank you so much for joining me on the journey. I really appreciate you all. Blessings and love, Joy 🙂

heart change PJ pin file image

Out of mist

december mist

Waking up to morning mist, I sense the otherworldliness of its obscurity.

Sight is dimmed. Senses dulled as dishwater.

Lost in fog. Muffled morphed outlines rising as shadows.

No compass points defining end from beginning.

December chill making body feel stilled as statue.

And here am I… frozen in poetic thought as the kettle boils hot…

As mist

Watching steam clouds billow reminds me
how our lives are but mist in lens of eternity
our deepest desires and dreams, hopes and schemes
in danger of being fizz, evanescence become
melting puddles of deliquescence
seeping into nothingness.


And all pleasures rise high as steam
then fall away as vapour dissipating
into darkness too dense for us to hold.
For all is fleeting, all is change, all is meeting place
where we surrender our goals and plans,
then taking up God’s gift of grace
we can sink restful, with trusting sigh,
leaving all to be rearranged by His loving hands.


He gathers every scattered act and thought
to make-over, remould good and true,
weaving them into a tapestry of His own design
where nought is wasted
only caught, drawn fine and new into
a lasting beauty to behold.
©JoyLenton

Misted wintry days remind me of how fleeting and changeable our dreams and schemes can be.

Though all desires surrendered to God become enlarged at His hands and so much more than we ever envisaged.

Happiness can vanish in an instant, ephemeral, lost in the ether.

Lasting, solid joy is found in relationship with God and following His ways for our lives.

He transforms everything by His grace. Makes us come alive on the inside.

Making beauty from brokenness, from the scattered ashes of our lives.

as mist poem pin image

Feeling, yielding and kneeling

black and white trees

‘Sometimes’

Sometimes I feel

stripped winter-bare and stark

skeletal ‘gainst the landscape

as winds whiplash

and cold and dark

scrape harsh to scratch

the bark of my extremities

when I am faced

with continual barrage

of life’s calamities

Sometimes I yield

as sapling, bend and sway

until twigs snap and quiver

and I shrink back

with hasty shiver as I try

to straighten on my own

against the fray

and flurry of the elements

at whose mercy I am thrown

in such disarray

Sometimes I kneel

with buckled frame

and creaking joints

at the sound of One

who calls my name

and bids me come to Him

above the chaos and the noise

seek strength from warming Sun

lift my eyes from dark and dim

with increasing calm and poise

sense heavenly rays ~ and I rejoice

©JoyLenton2014

This poem speaks about life’s dark times and challenges and how we can find peace and rest by coming back to the Father’s heart, lean hard on His grace, surrender, rest thankful and give Him praise.

Those “heavenly rays” can penetrate the darkest of days as grace glimmers shine best in the dark places and spaces of our lives.

One of the best ways we have of overcoming our low moods and sad thoughts is to make a conscious effort to be thankful and deliberately look for God’s hand on our lives. Keeping a daily gratitude journal is a great way to achieve this goal.

I spoke more about thanksgiving here and invited you to leave a comment about things you were grateful for. It also included participating in a random draw to win a free book.

**I’m delighted to announce that the winner of  the draw is Mandy. Well done you! A free copy of Ann Voskamp’s ‘One Thousand Gifts’ will be winging its way to you as soon as possible. May it bless your heart as it has mine**

black and white trees ~ Sometimes poem PJ pin