My Mother's Voice

I woke up this morning with a song on my mind and in my heart - a song we sang when we were teenagers. We just called them "choruses" in those days and we knew dozens of them! I hadn't heard this one in years!




     O I love to hear His voice, saying,
     "You belong to Me, You are not your own.
     With a price you're bought, and you're Mine
     eternally!"


     And I love to hear Him say, "I have saved
     you by My grace."

     And when I get to glory it will then be grander
     still - For I shall see His face!


I found myself straining to hear His voice. Listening in the early hours, filtering through the bird song and the music of ducks and goats and cows. And I heard it!


His voice! Reminding me that I do belong to Him! And will forever!

Remember "In the Garden"? He speaks and the sound of His voice, is so sweet the birds hush their singing, And the melody that He gave to me within my heart is ringing.....

Thank you, our Father, for music in our souls, for songs in the night, for the "music of the spheres," for melodies you bring to our hearts that we alone can hear.

And thank You for the voices we hear all around us.

Before my mother died I called her every day and we talked about many things: Jesus...politics...history...favorite birds and favorite presidents!

Often she called me. And I remember how wonderful it was to hear her say my name. It was sort of musical, sort of lilting. She said "Glorya" differently than any one else. I loved to hear her call me by name.

And I remember thinking I should get a small recorder and place it near the phone so I could have her voice saying my name kept close to me for all my life, because I knew how much I would miss hearing it after she was gone!

Well, I never did that. I never recorded her voice saying my name for future days of heartache and loneliness.

But, guess what! It didn't matter. It is recorded in my mind perfectly! And when I close my eyes and see her face, I can hear her voice saying "Glorya" in that magical way, anytime I need to hear it. So much better than a recording!

I remember reading some lines from young children trying to describe how their mother's voices sounded to them and one young girl said, "When my mother says my name it sounds like it feels good in her mouth."

That's the way I remember my mother's voice saying my name:  it sounded like it felt good in her mouth!


From John 10:

He who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep... To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. And when he brings out his own sheep he goes before them; and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.

In the time of Christ most villages had large, central pens, called sheepfolds. At the end of the day people brought their small individual flocks and led them into the sheepfold. The shepherds combined their resources and paid for a gatekeeper. He stayed with the sheep during the night.

In the morning the shepherds came to the sheepfold to gather up their own sheep. The gatekeeper knew them and let them in. The sheep were all mixed into one group, but when the shepherd called his sheep, they came up to him and he led them out. They came to him and followed him because they recognized his voice.

We can hear our Good Shepherd's voice every day -- in His Word, from His people, in our hearts. Someday we will hear it in a more dramatic way:

For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven, with a shout, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.

And so we will be with the Lord forever.

Therefore encourage each other with these words.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-17


Therefore encourage each other with these words.