Daily Devotions
Sanctify them in the truth; Your Word is truth. John 17:17
You know, if you keep your eyes and ears open, every day you can learn something new.
For example, researchers recently told me why children refuse to eat green vegetables. After watching dozens of toddlers play with all kinds of things which had been placed before them, the experts noticed the children eagerly laid claim to things like spoons and other manmade paraphernalia, but those same children showed a reluctance to grasp green, grocer type items.
According to the experts, evolution has biologically programmed children to be cautious when it comes to plants which might harbor potentially-hazardous poisons. That’s right; children have a mechanism which says: “Danger! Danger! Danger! Will Robinson! Potential poison here!”
Now it occurs to me if evolution was really being helpful, why doesn’t it go the rest of the way and help us distinguish between good foods and bad foods. Of course, it doesn’t do that. This is why we don’t eat mushrooms we discover in the woods. We don’t know which is tasty, which is poisonous, and which is going to send us on a spaced-out acid trip.
And if evolution can program us to stay away from dangerous things like green veggies, why hasn’t it programmed us to stay away from hot things like a stove or a fireplace? I know it hasn’t done that because all three of my children received minor burns investigating those things, which Pam and I had repeatedly warned were “hot and dangerous” and give them “owies.”
Or you might wonder why evolution didn’t take the easy path and teach children to listen to their mothers when they say, “Eat this, it’s good for you. It will help you grow up big and strong and make you beautiful and the envy of all.”
Now I’ve had a little bit of fun with this vegetable thing, but there is a point. That point is this: with no real proof behind the theories of those experts, it is faith that will determine whether you believe or reject what they have proposed.
Faith. Faith will determine whether you believe them, and faith is what determines whether you believe God’s holy Word.
Was Jesus the Son of God? Did He enter this world to save us from our sins? Did He fulfill the Law, and did He resist temptation? Did He die carrying all our transgressions, and has He paid the price which forgives us and promises us a place in heaven? Did Jesus rise from the dead on the third day, and has He shown to the world that death has been defeated?
If you believe the Lord and you have faith that holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit, then you believe these things to be true. If, on the other hand, you believe the Bible is nothing more than balderdash, then you will answer all the above questions with doubt and denial, skepticism and cynicism.
Now I don’t know what you are going to do, but I gladly embrace the realities of God’s Word. Why? Because I believe, “Thy Word is truth.”
THE PRAYER: Dear Lord, grant that I and everyone else may believe Your Word, which has shared the story of salvation and the sacrifice of the Savior. This I ask in the Name of Jesus who has died and risen to save me. Amen.