I hereby freely admit that I very well might have bitten off more than I can chew. There, I said it- phew! I'm sorry for the very late posts, but late is better than never. I am considering stopping this altogether, especially if I just cannot keep up. However, I am going to give it one more good attempt and see how it goes. I've decided that my time is a bit more precious than I had previously thought and learning how to best use my time is something I need to focus more on. But, for now, Chapter 2- A Heart Abiding in God's Word.
The writer compares our spiritual lives with that of a plant. Plants must have a good root system to survive the elements. So must you and I have spiritual roots that go down deep, to keep us up and alive in order to survive the "elements" of life. John 10 :10 says, "The thief's purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give life in all it's fullness." We hear plenty of people talk about how their life has no meaning, how there has to be more than this, etc. Yes, there is and you can only find that purpose, that meaning, in Christ. This is the beginning of a spiritual plant, the realization that our purpose comes from Him, and all of us have different purposes- different things to accomplish. Understanding our purpose can only come from time with the Lord, and reading the Word that He left for us.
Spending time in the quiet with Him and His Word develops our spiritual root system. What's the one thing common among all plants? You can't see their roots! Roots are unseen. I find the parallel perfect here. We cannot tell from the surface if a plant has a good root system or not. We can pull on the plant to see if it wiggles a little and with some investigation we can know if it does or don't have a good root system. When the hot sun comes and the wind blows, does our plant stand tall or does it droop and bend over? We cannot tell what kind of spiritual root system people have, but we can watch to see what happens when the pressures of this life come and the winds of change knock on their door. This is why I can't stress the importance of spending time reading the Word of God enough. We must develop our spiritual roots, so that when the challenges of life come upon us (and they most definitely will) we have what we need to survive. You can't get the deep, down roots by going to church every time the doors are open. You can't get the deep, down roots by doing. You can only get those deep, down roots by spending time with the Lord and Him alone.
Once we've made the decision to take the time to develop our root system, we can then take advantage of God's great exchange program. That's right- He has an exchange program and it's wonderful! Some can't believe that this is actually a real thing. I mean who gives you something for nothing? Who would do that? I'll tell you who- Jesus! He died to give us this exchange program! When I take time away from the world, away from anything or anyone else, to spend time with the Lord and His Word, I can exchange my weariness for His strength, my problems for His solutions, my burdens for His freedom, my frustrations for His peace, and the list goes on and on! Amazing, isn't it! I have been focused on this for several weeks now and it really has encouraged me more than I could ever tell you.
There is so much more to this chapter than these two points, so make sure you read the rest to learn what you can do to help develop your root system deeper and deeper.
Blessings to you and the love of Jesus Christ to you all.
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