Feeding On The Word
This Book of the Law (God's Word) shall not depart from your
mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you
may observe to do according to all that is written in it.
For then you will make your way prosperous, and
then you will have good success.
NKJV Joshua 1:8
God is giving us the secret to success in this verse. He wants
us to succeed at whatever we do. Notice, this principle works
for anyone, not just preachers.
Psalm 1 says of the person who delights in the Word and
meditates in it day and night,
And whatever he does shall prosper
(Psalm 1:3).
This will work for a person no matter what they do. According
to the Bible, your success as a Christian is directly related
to your relationship with God's Word. Will power alone is not
enough to cause you to live the Christian life. Sheer
determination will only get you so far. You need the power of
God's Word working in your life.
Thinking of God's Word as spiritual food has helped me better
understand the crucial role the Word plays in our lives. I
believe that many of the problems we face today in the church
are caused by spiritual malnutrition and could be solved as we
give the Word its' proper place in our lives.
The nutrients that the Word of God supplies are essential for
your success. As you feed on the Word of God, it gets in you
and when it does, healing, strength, wisdom and life comes out
of the Word and goes into you.
The Word of God is full of God. Jesus is called the Word made
flesh, so the Bible would be God in words. When you read the
Word you are feasting on spiritual food. Jesus said,
Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every
word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. (Matt
4:4)
Peter said we should desire God's Word so we can grow:
1 Peter 2:2 as newborn babes, desire the
pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby.
If the Word is food, then meditating on the Word is eating the
Word.
Jeremiah 15:16 Your words were found, and I
ate them, And Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my
heart;
Jeremiah found great joy in finding and eating God's Words and
so can we. In Joshua and the Psalms we are told that
meditating on the Word day and night is the key to success.
Maybe you've seen those promises before and felt like you
couldn't qualify because you have a job and a family and you
don't have time to meditate on anything day and night. Maybe
you thought this was only for people that didn't have much to
do. God wrote these promises to all of us and we can all
meditate on the Word day and night and still have a life, a
family and a job.
God doesn't expect us to quit our jobs and join a monastery in
order to meditate the Word day and night. He wrote His Word to
normal people, busy people and it is possible for us to follow
His directions in Psalm 1 and Joshua 1 and have good success.
Once again the key to understanding this principle is to see
the Word as spiritual food.
God didn't say we had to meditate the Word every minute of the
day and every minute of the night to succeed. He said “day and
night”, when the sun is up and when the sun is down. That's
the way most people eat. They eat when it is dark and they eat
when it is light, they eat day and night, not all day and all
night, if they did that they wouldn't have time to do anything
else. People eat day and night and still have a life and you
can feed on God's Word day and night and still have a life.
No matter how busy we are, we still manage to work food into
our schedule. Do the same with God's Word. Feeding on the Word
once or twice a week is not enough. We would never try to live
on one or two meals a week. For the Word to do it's work in
your life, you need a consistent diet every day. He is telling
us to work it into our lives. Don't compartmentalize the Word
and limit it just to church or one brief daily devotional
time. To be successful we need a day and night pattern to
develop.
Like food, the Word works when you put it in. You don't have
to tell it what to do. Just put it in your spirit and it goes
to work in you. You don't have to understand every word you
read or become a greek scholar. Just read it slowly and think
about it. Write down a verse or two to take with you during
the day and read it from time to time.
The bible is not a daily horoscope. It doesn't give specifics
about what is going to happen today at work or school. We
don't read it for its' poetic style or its' literary value.
It's not a novel or just a history book. It wasn't written to
stimulate the mind, but to feed the spirit. That's why unsaved
people can't appreciate the true value of the Word. When we as
Christians feed on the Word as it was intended the results are
powerful, it produces success
Enjoy your daily bible study time and don't have unrealistic
expectations. You don't have to have some new revelation every
time you read the Word. You don't have to feel goose bumps or
have some glorious, life changing experience every time you
read the bible.
When you sit down to eat a meal, it doesn't have to be the
best meal that you've ever experienced to be effective. You
may enjoy some meals more than others, but the purpose is to
get some fuel in your stomach. It's the same with God's Word,
there may be some devotional times that you enjoy more than
others, but the goal is to get God's Word in your spirit and
that happens every time you read it. Relax and enjoy it and
let the Word do the work.
Don't try to overdo it. Maybe you feel you're behind in your
bible reading and this is just what you need. Don't think you
can get ahead by reading the whole bible today. It's much like
food for the body, no matter how much you eat today, you still
need to eat tomorrow. In the same way, no matter how much
you've had in the past, you still need your daily allowance
today. Some people think they don't need to spend much time in
the Word because they've heard it or they love it or they
agree with the pastor when he preaches it or they've heard so
many sermons over the years. That's like saying, “I don't need
any food, I've had so much over the years and God knows I love
food and besides I know all about it.”
To be strong today, you need to eat today. It's the Word you
meditate day and night (right now) that will cause you to have
good success. Most people just aren't giving enough attention
to the Word to get the full benefits that God has promised.
One writer wrote, “Some Christians feed their bodies three hot
meals a day and feed their spirits two cold snacks a week and
wonder why they're weak in faith.”
If there was a bottle of liquid in a health food store that
could bring life and health to the body, peace to the mind and
success in life, people would stand in line and pay millions
of dollars and take it religiously. The vitamin and food
supplement business is a multibillion dollar industry in the
United States and it only promises health for the body. The
Word of God will do much more and it's free, but it has to be
taken regularly and consistently.
God is very practical and gives us practical advice on how to
get the Word in our hearts in the book of Deuteronomy:
"And these words which I command you today
shall be in your heart.7 You shall teach them diligently to
your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your
house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when
you rise up. Deuteronomy 6:6
God knew we would be busy and have a limited amount of time to
spend on spiritual things. So He's telling us how to work the
Word into our busy lives. Teach the Word to your children.
When you're having family time, spend some time in the Word.
When you sit in your house, you're on your own time, take some
time to talk about God's Word. When you walk by the way or
nowadays, drive down the street, talk about God's Word. Take
some scriptures with you throughout the day and be ready to
mention them to another believer or whisper them to yourself,
meditate them.
When you lie down at night remember God's Word, when you get
up in the morning feed on the scriptures. It doesn't take any
extra time out of your day to do this. These are times when
you are talking or thinking about something anyway, just make
a point to include God's Word. This is how you meditate it day
and night.
Get some good CD's with the Word on them and put them in your
car and home stereo. Get an iPod and listen to some good
Word-filled sermons when you walk or work out or relax. You
can even put the bible on many cell phones and have something
to read when you're standing in line or sitting in a waiting
room.
There are many creative ways to get your daily recommended
allowance of God's Word without taking up any more time. The
person who meditates on God's Word day and night will make
their way prosperous and have good success. This means the
results are well worth the effort!
France and Tanzania
In October I held a meeting in Versailles, France just outside
of Paris. I spoke for Pastor Tim and Vickie Kilstrom and we
had an awesome meeting. The people came morning and night to
hear the Word of God and many were touched and delivered by
the power of God in the altar ministry. This was the 5th time
I have been to France to minister and it is always a privilege
to minister the Word of God to these hungry people.
In December I returned to Tanzania, East Africa to do a
ministers' conference with Evangelist Egon Falk. This was a
trip that was postponed last year because of the death of my
father. I taught morning and evening for five days along with
several other speakers. Once again I was amazed to see the
hunger and the zeal of the African people as they came from
8:30 am until nearly 6 pm each evening. There was preaching,
teaching, dancing, altar ministry and great joy as the guests
experienced a week of impartation. Thank you for helping me to
go and deliver our most valuable export, God's Word, to these
hungry people!
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