Published by admin on 25 Apr 2002 at 05:04 pm
SHOPPING FOR THE TRUTH
My wife and I were talking last night about shopping in the grocery store. Don’t you men know your wife has lots of good ideas, that she’s not just another pretty face? She gave me a good idea for an article. So I will give her credit where credit is due. Of course, she prefers cash. Or better yet, diamonds and gold. My lovely wife is one of four sisters. They all grew up in the same house, had the same parents, lived together, ate the same food, and yet, if you send them to the grocery store to shop, each of them will come home with different stuff in their bags. Now, why is that?
Even though the grocery store has many items, unless you’re filthy rich, you only buy some of them. Generally speaking, you will buy what you like. Some will buy certain items like veggies, because they’ve been taught by Mom and Dad they’re good for you. Otherwise we’d all live on hot dogs, chocolate cake and ice cream. But the longer you live away from your parents, the more your shopping list changes. You start getting ideas of your own, and sooner or later, you shop entirely according to your own taste.
Let’s look at the Holy Bible as a grocery store. It’s shelves are stocked to the max with all kinds of different items, anything you could possibly want or need. Now all the groceries in the Bible are good for you, there’s nothing illegal, immoral, or fattening in there. It’s the best place on earth to shop.
Some would love to have steak, but they look at it longingly and sigh, and walk down the aisle and pick up a package of bologna. Moving on, that same shopper might grab a sack of potatoes and ignore the onions, because they don’t want anything to do with onions. Yuk! They know they should eat some veggies, so just to pacify what they’ve been taught by Mom and Dad, they throw a couple cans of mixed vegetables in the cart. Not too many, just enough so as not to feel guilty. And they pass up the Pizza, because Mom and Dad taught them to always eat a “square meal”. So much for satisfying Mom and Dad. Grab a box of cold cereal for convenience, because it takes too much time to cook a real breakfast. Oh yes, and don’t forget the milk. Make that skim milk. Gotta watch the fat.
When they go to the checkout, they have bologna and potatoes, a couple cans of veggies, cold cereal, and skim milk.
Now, let’s put this all together. The Bible has many teachings. Some would say, I wish I had faith to believe that healing is for today, I’d love to have it. I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired. But in our church, we’ve been taught that Jesus healed in the Bible days, but healing isn’t for today. Grandma and Grandpa, Mom and Dad went to that church. I go to that church too. We’ve always believed that way. As for that “speaking in tongues” stuff, I don’t believe that’s for today, and I don’t want anything to do with it. Maybe the “onions” that they want nothing to do with is the teaching that they really need. It’s in there, alright, but they choose to pass it by. So they miss out.
And they also miss out on the “steak”. Oh, they want it, but lack the faith to receive it, and therefore, they settle for the “bologna”, thinking that’s the best God has for them. You know what they say, money is the root of all evil. Stay with me, I’m going somewhere with this.
You ladies know it takes time and effort to make a real breakfast, and it’s much easier just to give everyone a cold bowl of cereal. And it takes time and effort to get into the Word of God and get a good meal. Most people want to be spoon fed by their Pastor for 45 minutes once a week and hope it will hold them over till next week. But it won’t. That’s why there are so many undernourished Christians out there. Skinny as a beanpole, so skinny they only have one side. First Peter 2:2 says, “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.” You see, if you get into the “milk” of the word, you will grow. There’s fat in milk, and fat gives you energy to grow on. But if you try to live on skim milk, you’ll die, because there’s nothing in it to sustain you, let alone make you grow.
What is “skim milk”? That’s grabbing your Bible once a week, dusting it off, toting it to church, and then trying to find the place where the Pastor is teaching from. You skim through your Bible frantically, and by the time you find the book he’s teaching from, he’s already done. So you plop it back on the shelf back home and go on with your life.
Now, all this time, Satan’s watching you, waiting for the opportunity to put sickness on you, and steal your goods. He knows you haven’t been studying your Bible, so you’ll be easy pickin’s. Mom and Dad were lazy Christians who refused to get into the word and find out what belonged to them. Well, it was good enough for them, it’s good enough for me, right?
Mom and Dad represent tradition here. Some tradition is good, like teaching on salvation. But some kids when they move away from home, get into their Bible and find there is more than salvation in there. And they start changing their shopping list. Oh, they keep stocked up on salvation, that’s a staple. But they’re trying out new foods, too..healing, for example. Yep, that’s good. I’ll add that to my shopping list. I think I’ll check out this “speaking in tongues”. Oh yes, that’s good, that goes on the list too, from now on.
Hmmm. That steak looks mighty good, but Mom and Dad said I will never be able to afford that. Guess I’d better stick to bologna. No, wait, I’m big now, I’m gonna buy what I want. I’m having steak tonight! And no more skim milk. I want some of the whole stuff! God can feed me better than bologna and skim milk. After all, God said I’m His kid now, ever since He adopted me into His family. He’s rich. He’s my heavenly Father. He’s my Daddy!
I can’t believe all these years I’ve been eating bologna and skim milk when I could have had steak and whole milk. I think I’ll tell Mom and Dad how good this steak and milk is….