who through life has been my guide

Elisha entered the house and found the boy stretched out on the bed dead. He went into the room and locked the door—just the two of them in the room—and prayed to God. He then got into bed with the boy and covered him with his body, mouth on mouth, eyes on eyes, hands on hands. As he was stretched out over him like that, the boy's body became warm. Elisha got up and paced back and forth in the room. Then he went back and stretched himself upon the boy again. The boy started sneezing—seven times he sneezed!—and opened his eyes.

2 Kings 4:32 (the message)

This is the song I'm singing today to my Jesus, to the One who is Hope. This is the song I'm singing today for my brother in prison, my brother Andy in Milwaukee, my dear friends at Imagine Art...

All the way my Savior leads me
Who have I to ask beside
How could I doubt His tender mercy
Who through life has been my guide

All the way my Savior leads me
Cheers each winding path I tread
Gives me grace for every trial
Feeds me with the living Bread

I continue to have this fascination with the show "Man vs. Wild." To watch Bear Grylls survive in the most impossible situations is something that gives me hope. Bear's circumstances are terrains that just push man's physical limit, and as I watch him drink water from a camel's gut and make a shelter out of it's carcass, I think about what we cling to when the journey becomes seemingly unbearable.

Hopefully it's Jesus we cling to. It's got to be Jesus.

You lead me and keep me from falling
You carry me close to Your heart
And surely Your goodness and mercy will follow me

I watch as Bear shows how to survive falling through ice into an icy river. He strips down to his underwear and you can almost feel the chill, the bone numbing effect as he jumps in and swims under the ice looking for a thin place to break back through. He pulls his body out with his last strength, all the while describing his blurred vision and sluggish limbs. He doesn't need to, it's very obvious the body is not made to survive long in what he attempted. As he sits in front of a small fire on a patch of ice, the thawing comes.

I think of the wounding I have survived, how sometimes the ice that covers my heart is easier to take than the pain of facing the warming realization of all that's occurred. What's been lost. We resist the thaw, embrace the numb. But when we succomb to the healing and endure the prickling pain that ebbs into our cold being, there are Arms to warm, there is a Blood that courses through, there is a Fire to restore, and a Love that opens our eyes.

All the way my Savior leads me
O, the fullness of His love
O, the sureness of His promise
In the triumph of His blood
And when my spirit clothed immortal
Wings it's flight to realms of day
This my song through endless ages
Jesus led me all the way
Jesus led me all the way

All the way my Savior leads me
All the way my Savior leads me

(lyrics from All the Way My Savior Leads Me, Chris Tomlin)