Dear Sister,
Have you ever helplessly watched as someone starved to death? For two weeks I stayed by his side and waited. And then he died and we buried him. He had wanted no heroics in those last days and so we simply watched and waited as the sweetest man in the world also waited quietly to see Jesus.
Physical starvation is not unlike spiritual starvation in certain ways. Though physical inability to take in nutrition is usually a medical issue, not a choice, it is similar to spiritual starvation in that life and energy are sapped, the body or soul shrivel, and life is seriously compromised.
Most of us love to eat, some live to eat. Eating is enjoyable. A lovely dinner laid out on a linen cloth accompanied by fresh flowers, good friends or family and conversation feed the body along with many of our senses. But even eating on the run benefits us without our even thinking much about it. We must have food, with or without all the bells and whistles, in order to survive.
Souls must be fed or they too shrivel and languish. Sometimes a meal will be luxurious, sometimes it will be ordinary, sometimes it will taste delicious, sometimes it will be bitter, but every spiritual meal or morsel is important for the health of our souls.
From where does this food come? From a plentiful garden of sorts. A garden with seeds sown from and by the hand of God, watered by His Spirit, brought to harvest in our souls by His means of grace. We resist these means to our great peril, to the endangerment of our souls. We must take and eat. Sometimes the meal is perfectly prepared and shared with others as we worship together on a Sunday morning…God’s Word in a sermon, our hearts and voices united in songs of praise, biblically informed prayers, the works of Christ portrayed in His supper and in the baptism of His children.
Sometimes the emotions are elevated with the food. At times we barely taste the sumptuous fare, our hearts heavy with burdens or sins. But it is food, nonetheless, whether a sermon, the personal reading of God’s Word and prayers, the symbols, all vital to our souls’ well-being for correction, for discipline, for instruction in righteousness, for encouragement, so that we, as God’s children, as we feed on Christ, grow and mature and become thoroughly equipped to obey Jesus and become like Him.
We can gorge physically, hindering optimal health, but it is difficult to overeat in the things of God unless we fail to use His meat and resulting energy in the exercising of righteousness and love and good works. His food whets our appetite, not only for our own consumption and energy and outworking but for the feeding of others beyond ourselves.
Eat, dear Sister. Eat from His abundant banquet. When you’re hungry. When you think you’re not. The strange thing about His food is that the more one ingests the more it satisfies, simultaneously causing more and more hunger.
This is a food that is vital to consume whether or not we feel the pangs of hunger. Don’t neglect the things God deems beneficial to spiritual health, things which sometimes taste as sweet as honey, things which sometimes can be bitter in the swallowing but all things which nourish every cell of our spiritual selves. Eat from His Word, pray, worship by yourself and with others, feed on Christ in the Lord’s Supper, be baptized, watch baptisms, fellowship with God’s people. When you feel like it. When you don’t feel like it. Your spirit will imperceptibly grow stronger, more mature, more robust, more like Jesus. You were made for this. And someday He will take us home where we will see the Bread of Life face-to-face, whole and safe and fully satisfied.
Until then, eat heartily and often.
Cherry
“My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness…”
Psalm 63:5a