5-24-2014

Good Morning All,

        Psalm 107:9; “For he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul he fills with good things.”

       One day, a number of years ago, my then 2 ½ year old told his grandmother, “I’s hungry, do you have sumpy eat?”  So my mother found him a cookie and off he went.  He was hungry so he found something to eat.  Now, had he not found something to eat; he would have been a little grumpy.  He would have been irritable and moody.  But as long as he was fed, he was fine.

    Most of us are like that, we tend to have hunger pains once in a while.  Yet as humans sometimes our hunger is more than physical.  While our physical hunger may be met by food or drink, we may also have intellectual hunger which is only sated by information and knowledge.  We may have emotional hunger which really only gets met by experiencing love.  We also experience a spiritual hunger which really can only be fed by God.

    We might go looking elsewhere, but like filling up on Twinkies and ho-hos will not truly satisfy us physically; so to the many false teachings and world views will always leave us empty.  We need the good nutrition for our souls; we need God’s words of forgiveness and we need his grace to comfort us.  We need to remember that the bread and the wine which gives us his body and blood are still the original comfort foods.

    Just like our physical hunger needs to be fed every day, so does our spiritual hunger needs to be fed, every day.  We need to be fed by His Word every day.  We need to spend time in His Word hearing the richness of his great love and the wonders of his mercy.  We need the comfort of his forgiveness and the tenderness of his grace.  We need to share in this feeding with our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ as we grow together.  It is through this feeding that we grow and the church grows as well being fed the proper diet for our souls.

    So we must eat every day and not miss a meal for if we do we can become weak and cranky.  We can become discontented with what God has given us.  Just like physical hunger can make us weak and susceptible to disease or illness and to gorging ourselves on unhealthy foods.  We can also be susceptible to the temptation which the devil will throw at us.  We can be so weak that we will seek our comfort and our hope elsewhere and find it woefully lacking when our need arises.  We are only truly nourished by God’s grace.  We are only fed by His Word.  Everything else is just so much junk food. 

    So take time every single day to be in God’s Word.  Relish it, savor it, enjoy the wonderful good news of salvation which it gives to you.  Let God strengthen you with his spirit of love and hope.  Taste and see that the Lord is good.

Father in heaven, you feed us with your Word and you sustain us with your grace.  Strengthen us that we may withstand the devil’s arrows and draw closer to you.  Be with those who feed on the “junk food” which this world calls nourishment.  Help those who hunger to be fed by your satisfying Word that they may know the hope of eternity with you.  In the precious name of Jesus, our risen Savior, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret