30 Days with the Word – January 20

30 Days with THE WORD
January 20, 2021

John 1:1-2, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God. He (the Word) was in the beginning with God (NKJV).’

I brewed myself up a cup of tea. I placed the spoonful of honey in the cup and set the teapot to boil and looked through my selection of teabags. Settling on one with a jolt of energy, I unwrapped it and dropped it in the mug. Soon the pot whistled at me. I whistled back; it is a fine day for a cup of hot tea and honey, I thought, as I watched the flakes meander to the ground. Even the sound of the boiling water being poured into my mug was happy. I dabbed at the teabag with the tip of the spoon as I swirled the mixture, incorporating the honey. It wouldn’t take long; I withdrew the teabag and set it aside, then after blowing a steady stream of air across the tea in an attempt to cool it, I tempted a taste. It was hot and warming, sweet and…weak. Disappointed, I set the mug down, plopped the teabag back in the cup, and wandered away to tidy the kitchen.

Well, the phone rang, the Amazon man came to the door and I decided to get my outdoor chores finished before the snow stuck to the ground. What a pleasant surprise I remembered waited for me when I unearthed myself from my winter clothes as I stuck the mug inside the microwave to warm it back up. This time it was far from weak.

The longer I steep with Jesus the stronger I become. I can dip myself in His Word just a little bit, just a time or two, barely enough to be influenced by Him yet enough to bear a hint of His flavor. But I can wager, if I am just barely touching the surface, it is not enough to be stained, changed, transformed.
Submerge me in Him, drench me in His Word, soak me in His presence, dunk me in the inner circle of His ubiquity, steep me in His grace, and I assure you, I will be forever altered. It is not possible to be immersed in Him without absorbing Him into your very being.

Romans 12:1-2, ‘So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for Him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out! Readily recognize what He wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you (MSG).’