It may be my favorite psalm, Lord. Psalm 121.

At any rate, as soon as I see that it’s next on my reading plan, my heart gets a thrill. Like this morning. And immediately, my mind jumps to May 1983, our first night as missionaries in that little dried-up mining town of Firminy, France. Odette and I are holding hands across the space between our beds and reciting it in French, reciting what we’d memorized to help prepare us for our journey.

And now, thirty-six years later, 36!, I’m still here, Lord. Still in France. Because you have kept me.

You’ve. Kept. Me.

Today, as I read in a new translation, (to me), The Christian Standard Bible, all the other translations I know leap out at me. You are described as: my Keeper (NASB), my Guardian (The Message), my Protector (CSB), the One who helps and watches over me (NIV), Celui qui te garde (Louis Segond)…

Maranatha! Viens, Seigneur, Viens!

Come, Lord Jesus, Come!

That refrain pops into my mind because it comes immediately after the first lines of the psalm in that old French song that we learned back in 1983.

Today my heart is full. It’s been hot, Lord, and we’ve had days to putter in the yard and make it so welcoming. The roses, the geraniums, the strawberries and raspberries giving their meager but delicious crops, the tomatoes beginning to grow on the vine, the laundry, fresh and sweet-smelling, drying on the line, the pool uncovered, the sweet goldfish that the grandkids bought swimming in the pond. Life in France.

And long walks where I make up scenes for my new novel and dictate them into my phone! Who knew?

You’ve kept me, Lord. Kept me through singleness and marriage, kids and grandkids, friends from around the globe visiting. You’ve kept me as the starry-eyes idealist who wanted to save the world, and through deep despair and depression and into more joy and more grace received. In every season of my life, You’ve been my Keeper, my Helper, my Protector, my Guardian, my ALL. My all-powerful God.

How can it be that the God of the universe, of the galaxies and beyond, is my God? How can it be?

Recently, reading again the story of the prostitute wiping Jesus’ feet with her tears, I kept thinking how ‘he (or she) who has been forgiven much, loves much’. And how my life has been realizing more and more how much I’ve been forgiven which in turn allows me to love you more and more.

Please let me grow in this love, Lord, as that old praise chorus says:

I keep falling in love with You, over and over and over again
I keep falling in love with You, over and over and over again
It gets sweeter and sweeter as the days go by
Oh, what a love between my Lord and I
Keep falling in love with you, over and over and over and over again.

This is my prayer, heartfelt and soul searching, Lord, please help me to keep falling in love with you over and over and over and over again.

Lord, I will always be a sensitive soul who is easily overwhelmed by life. And You will always be my Keeper. Thank you for those whispers of “Lizzie, you’re right where I want you to be. Keep being you.”

That’s all You ask of me, isn’t it, Lord? And by Your grace, it’s what I’ve given myself permission to do more and more. And oh, the freedom when I walk in it. This is the way You have kept me in France. By helping me be myself and use my gifts and leave behind the false-guilt that comes when I look around at what You’re calling other to do and be.

That will always be a temptation, to fall into guilt, but how much more quickly I confess and call out for help. From You. My Keeper.

Thank you for summer, for life, for Paul, for work, for stories to tell, and workers to encourage and children and grandchildren to love and pray for and turn over again to You.

Merci.

Je lève mes yeux vers les montagnes, d’où me viendra le secours? Le secours me vient de l’Eternel…
I lift my eyes to the mountains from whence cometh my help? My help comes from the Lord…

How has the Lord kept you recently?