Guest Post - Words of Hope

I am so behind on posting and that includes sharing Mini's latest columns.  I think I am currently 2 or 3 behind...and I feel horrible.  She pours so much into these columns with the hope that they reach people and change hearts and I am such a slacker and haven't done what I could by posting.  I am a bad Mama right now :(

 

Hopefully I will be caught up on these within a couple of weeks. Below is one of Hope's most recent articles.

 

 

                Do you ever just pray and pray about something and ask for God’s guidance, but you feel like you never receive it? I think that this is probably something that happens frequently in the average Christian’s life. In most (not necessarily all) cases, the root of the problem can be traced back to the lack of growth within you.

          When you first become a believer or undergo this revival in your spiritual life, you are SO passionate and ready to receive whatever God gives you. You pour your time into the word and prayer and whatever could satisfy this hunger inside of you to become as close to God as you possibly can. But then what happens? Life happens. Everyone is stretching you into a different direction and demanding your time and your mind and your energy and you just become exhausted and preoccupied. Your prayers become shorter with less emotion, your bible reading turns into skimming or you just stop reading altogether. And slowly but surely, you lose that passion you had. I don’t know about you, but when I reach this point, God seems to get pretty quiet. Why is that?

          Let’s take a look into an Old Testament book that I am reading for the very first time: Ezekiel. When this book starts out, God is MAD at Israel. He has given them years and years and years of signs and warnings to turn from their idols, but they refuse. Their hearts are far from God. So God tells Ezekiel that he is to go to Israel and tell them all about what is going to happen to them. In Ezekiel 2, God hands Ezekiel a scroll filled with “words of lament and mourning and woe” that he is to deliver to the people. But God starts to tell him some pretty strange stuff.

Ezekiel 3:1-3 “And he said to me, “Son of man, eat what is before you, eat this scroll; then go and speak to the people of Israel.”  So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat. Then he said to me, “Son of man, eat this scroll I am giving you and fill your stomach with it.” So I ate it, and it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth.”

          That’s a pretty strange request if you ask me. History shows that these scrolls were normally made out of insanely thick paper or even hard leather. Just imagine digesting an entire scroll made out of leather… God was definitely trying to get some underlying point across. Maybe not just to Ezekiel (I’ll probably be able to answer that when I actually finish the book), but maybe a lesson in itself. If you notice, Ezekiel didn’t say something along the lines of “it was really bitter and hard to swallow, but I do as God commands and it was worth it”. No, he says that it tasted sweet. It was delightful and it filled his stomach to the point of no more hunger. I believe that God is telling us that we must absolutely consume his word in order to grow.

          If you look in other parts of this book, God is constantly telling Ezekiel to stand up and basically prepare to be used. A device called repetition is used here, and for any other English geeks like me, you know that if something is being repeated, it is of major importance. As used here, the underlying message is that in order for God to use you or guide you or even seriously dwell in your heart, you MUST eat the word of God.

          So the moral of the story is this: If you want a constant revival, something that you will never ever lose, start consuming the word of God. Get all that you can get, read all that you can read. Take notes, do bible studies. Be in the word every single day. It may be tough at first (like leather) to take that time out of every day to read, but I can promise you that it will be sweet as honey. God’s word will fill you up and you will experience that revival we all love every single day. God bless.