A few Sundays ago at my church we had the privledge to hear Wayne Corderio who is the Pastor of New Hope Christian Fellowship in Hawaii speak. He was a captivating speaker and delivered a great message concerning learning how to feed yourself from the Bible. The service and his message is certainly worth your time to watch, you can check it out here.
Have you ever been to busy? I sure have and more times than I care to admit I let this be my excuse for not practicing self feeding. How many times have I thought over the years that I’ll just get my feeding on Sunday. Just let the pastor tell me what I need to know, he’s the one with the degree in theology and he can more properly understand all this that is written between the covers of the book. He’s studied Greek, he’s formally trained in hermeneutics, formally trained in Biblical exegesis, and he can really deliver the message in a way my brain can understand. Therefore this has got to be the best way, correct? That’s what I’ve used over the years when I’ve felt guilty about not digging into the Word as often as I should. As I’ve grown older this habit has gotten better, but I’m by no means perfect. Never will be perfect, but instead, I’ll settle for constant and steady improvement.
From Wayne’s illustration of a plant putting down roots I see that there is a delicate balance between fruit bearing and root growth. I see this in our garden in the back yard. When the roots of the cucumber plants don’t get the water they need the leaves start to wither. As they begin to wither the production of cucumbers slows. The cucumbers are the indicator plant for watering in our garden. We see the leaves wrinkle a tiny bit, we water, and the next morning they look strong again. This example from my garden and Wayne’s example really put wheels on the need to self feed, daily.
In actuality, it is not up to our pastors to be the sole provider of our meals for the week. It’s up to us as individuals to seek and see the Lord through his word.
II Timothy 3:16-17 says…
All scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
This passage tells me that the scriptures, inspired to men and exhaled by God, are there so I can learn, so I can be corrected, and so I’ll be ready for the task when it arises. The one little three letter word in there, man, and the phrase that it resides in, “so that the man of God”, sums it up for me. It doesn’t say, “so that the pastor” or “so that my wife”, or “so that my friend” will learn and be equipped to bear fruit. It’s pointing right at me and it’s telling me to pull up a chair to the table and dig in!
Habits aren’t built in a day and discipline is usually not fun either. But again, the word is there for us to learn from. Check out this tidbit…
No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Hebrews 12:11
Will you travel with me as I turn up the heat on my feeding times?
0 comments:
Post a Comment