Flourish like the Palm Tree

I recently finished, Aging With Grace, by Sharon W. Betters and Susan Hunt. I pulled these verses and quotes from there. Great promises and wisdom for growing old in the Lord.

“Listen to me, O house of Jacob,

    all the remnant of the house of Israel,

who have been borne by me from before your birth,

    carried from the womb; 

even to your old age I am he,

    and to gray hairs I will carry you.

I have made, and I will bear;

    I will carry and will save.

Isaiah 46:3,4

The righteous flourish like the palm tree

    and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. 

They are planted in the house of the Lord;

    they flourish in the courts of our God. 

They still bear fruit in old age;

    they are ever full of sap and green,

to declare that the Lord is upright;

    he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

Psalm 92:12-15

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 faint.

Isaiah 40:31

For you, O Lord, are my hope,

my trust, O Lord, from my youth.

Upon you I have leaned from before my birth;

you are he who took me from my mother's womb.

I have been as a portent to many,

but you are my strong refuge.

My mouth is filled with your praise,

and with your glory all the day.

My praise is continually of you.

Do not cast me off in the time of old age;   

forsake me not when my strength is spent.

O God, be not far from me;   

O my God, make haste to help me!

But I will hope continually   

and will praise you yet more and more.

O God, from my youth you have taught me,

and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds.

So even to old age and gray hairs,

O God, do not forsake me,

until I proclaim your might to another generation,

your power to all those to come.

Psalm 71: 5 - 9, 12, 14, 17, 18 

But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him,

    and his righteousness to children's children,

to those who keep his covenant

    and remember to do his commandments.

Psalm 103:17,18

One generation shall commend your works to another,

    and shall declare your mighty acts

Psalm 145:4

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

John 12:24

“There is no growing in grace apart from prayer.” (p. 134)

“From my eighty-year old perspective I can now look back and see that nothing was random; nothing was wasted. God used, amd continues to use, everything - my sin, the sin of others against me, the disappointments, sorrows, grief, suffering, times of rejoicing, and times of weeping- to shape me into his images I would not change anything because each thing drew me nearer to him.” (pg.135)

“A long view helps us see God’s gracious hand of providence weaving everything together for his glory and our good.”  (pg. 140) 

“One joy of aging is a stillness of soul that helps us see the small moments as sacred moments when we can reflect God’s glory to someone else.”  (pg. 145)

“When we put down our pen, stop trying to write our story or the stories of others and wholeheartedly trust the author of our story to write his gospel story in our lives, we begin to see the mundane and the miserable moments as essential sentences that eventually become a majestic story of grace, because the plot of dirt where we die is also the place where we flourish.”

(pg. 146)