5 weeks to go

Today marks 5 weeks until we meet our dear Louisa, Lord willing.  Nick and I have been reading a Psalm together every night right before we go to sleep since we found out her HLHS diagnosis.  Last night was Psalm 84 and then this morning the little Spurgeon thing I read was on a verse from that.  I have been feeling a bit emotionally and physically weary this week and the Lord again knew just what I needed for some real encouragement.

How lovely is your dwelling place,
    O Lord of hosts!
² My soul longs, yes, faints
    for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and flesh sing for joy
    to the living God.

³ Even the sparrow finds a home,
    and the swallow a nest for herself,
    where she may lay her young,
at your altars, O Lord of hosts,
    my King and my God.
⁴ Blessed are those who dwell in your house,
    ever singing your praise! Selah

⁵ Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
    in whose heart are the highways to Zion.^[b]
6 As they go through the Valley of Baca
    they make it a place of springs;
    the early rain also covers it with pools.
⁷ They go from strength to strength;
    each one appears before God in Zion.

⁸ O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer;
    give ear, O God of Jacob! Selah
⁹ Behold our shield, O God;
    look on the face of your anointed!

¹⁰ For a day in your courts is better
    than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
    than dwell in the tents of wickedness.
¹¹ For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
    the Lord bestows favor and honor.
No good thing does he withhold
    from those who walk uprightly.
¹² O Lord of hosts,
    blessed is the one who trusts in you!

 THEY GO FROM STRENGTH TO STRENGTH. - PSALM 84:7

"They go from strength to strength."  There are various renderings of these words, but all of them contain the idea of progress.  "They go from strength to strength."  That is, they grow stronger and stronger.  Usually, if we are walking we go from strength to weakness; we start fresh and in good order for our journey, but by and by the road is rough, and the sun is hot; so we sit down by the wayside and then resume our weary way.  But the Christian pilgrim, having obtained fresh supplies of grace, is as vigorous after years of weary travel and struggle as when he first set out.  He may not be quite so elated and buoyant, nor perhaps quite so hot and hasty in his zeal as he once was, but he is much stronger in all that constitutes real power; and if he travels more slowly, he does so more surely.  ..."Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not be faint."  Is. 40:30-31.  Fretful spirits sit down and trouble themselves about the future.  "Unfortunately," they say, "we go from affliction to affliction."  Very true, O you of little faith; but you go from strength to strength also.  You will never find a bundle of affliction that does not have in it somewhere sufficient grace.  God will give the strength of ripe maturity along with the burden allotted to full-grown shoulders.