Hungry? – The Kingdom Curriculum XV (5)

Hungry?

The great commandment

And He said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and the first commandment.” Matthew 22:37, 38

“Your words were found, and I ate them, and Your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by Your Name, O LORD God of hosts.” Jeremiah 15:16

What’s That You’re Eating?

Now, I wonder why Jeremiah loved the Word of God so much. Could it be because in “devouring” God’s Word he was filling himself up with God?

Jeremiah found it a joy–the delight of his heart–to read, meditate on, and study the Word of God. Job said that God’s Word was more important to him than the food he ate each day (Job 23:12). I doubt many of us think about time in Scripture as equivalent to time at the food trough. C. S. Lewis has a wonderful poem about just how important feeding on Scripture is. He says that when we feed on physical food, the work of digestion transforms that food into us. But when we are seeking the Lord in His Word, feeding line upon line and precept upon precept, His spiritual food enters into our souls, and we are transformed into it.

How about you? How would you describe your time in the Word of God? Is it like Jeremiah’s and Job’s? A glorious delight, so important that you won’t even let eating get in the way of it? Do you sense when you go to the Word of God that you are feasting on Him? Encountering Him in His glory? The Word of God is the spiritual food the Lord readies for us anew each morning. When we love to seek Him as we should, we will rejoice to feed on the banquet He prepares for us each day.

Recently I received a Valentine from Susie, perched strategically on the seat where I have my morning devotions. I tore that thing open, eager to read what she had to say to me. I wasn’t disappointed, believe me. God is sending daily Valentines to us, brethren, and more: He is serving up just the spiritual nutrition we will need for the day ahead. If we aren’t hungry for His daily fare, eager to savor every word, and willing to put everything else on hold until we’ve found the Lord in Scripture–well, perhaps we need to admit that our love for God is not at the level it ought to be.

Which just means that something else is occupying that place. Hmmm.

Learn to love God more by meditating in His Law daily. You can order your copy of The Law of God today and take up this discipline with joy. Go to www.MyParuchia.com, point your browser to “Publications,” then click on the drop-down option, “Waxed Tablet Publications.”

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T.M. Moore.

T.M. Moore is editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001,2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Editor’s note: The use of a translation other than the Authorised Version in an article does not constitute an endorsement in whole or in part by The Christian Observer.