Every. Single. Day…(Savor by Shaunna Niequist is a must-read.)
Brush your teeth.
Floss.
Wash your hands.
Take your vitamins.
Don’t forget your meds…
Especially if some of the above phrases come from your doctor, we’d all be wise to heed his or her advice. Every day. Right?
Every. Single. Day.
What if we added one more daily activity, guaranteed to help us and all those who cross our path?
I ran across this idea in a new devotional I’m crazy about. (One can never have too many devotionals, right?) You may want to consider this for a Christmas gift for your friends or family members. Little fun fact: in addition to three hundred and sixty-five devotions, about every ten to fifteen pages, Shauna includes fun recipes!
It’s called Savor: Living Abundantly Where You Are, As You Are by Shauna Niequist. (www.shaunaniequist.com ) Shauna is a beautiful young wife to Aaron and Mom of two boys, Henry and Mac. She also happens to be the daughter of well-known preacher, teacher and writer, Bill Hybels and his sweet wife, Lynne. (www.billhybels.org and www.lynnehybels.com )
Shauna wrote this devotional to teach us readers ways to savor our lives. This encompasses our children, friends and family, our community, God’s creation, etc. She says, “This is my attempt to clear away space and noise, inviting you to hear the ‘drumbeat’. God’s always speaking, always.
He’s always moving,
Always present,
Always creating,
Always healing.
The trick, at least for me, is paying attention.
The trick is savoring.”
As God would orchestrate, my Wednesday Bible study group just finished Armor of God by Priscilla Shirer. We declared it’s a manual for the Christian Life. Priscilla says we must put on the Armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18) daily…and, in a gazillion other ways, she says we must have our faces planted in His Word every day.
Every. Single. Day.
I just so happened to bring Shauna’s devotional with me to Bible study for Show and Tell. Don’t you know that day’s devotion was right out of Psalm 1:1-3…
“Blessed is the one…whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on His law day and night. That person is a like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do prospers.” (Note we’ll be blessed when we delight in His Word, when we meditate on it day and night.)
Eugene Peterson’s wording from the same passage above in The Message is simultaneously amusing (“Smart-Mouth College!!!”) and to the point:
“How well God must like you—
You don’t hang out at Sin Saloon,
You don’t sling along Dead-End Road,
You don’t go to Smart-Mouth College.
Instead you thrill to God’s Word,
You chew on Scripture day and night.
You’re a tree replanted in Eden,
Bearing fresh fruit every month,
Never dropping a leaf,
Always in blossom.”
You know the saying, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” Same can be said for our Christian walk. The more we study the Bible, the more we become Christ-like, yielding fruit for Him, bearing “fresh fruit.”
Joshua 1:8 tell us, “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
Psalm 119:97 simply says, “Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long.”
Friends, these are just three of seventy-one verses in the Bible on Meditation. (Check out www.openbible.info to see more.) My Life Application Bible says, “Meditating means spending time reading and thinking about what you’ve read—asking yourself how you can change so you will live as God wants you to.” As my friend Caroline says, “That’s where the rubber meets the road.”
Shauna says her Dad suggests:
“… every Christian needs to spend time alone with God every day, praying, listening, reading the Bible, letting ourselves be reminded that we are God’s creation, God’s children.”
Every. Single. Day.
Shauna adds, “God wants his people to trust Him daily, to need Him and follow Him every morning with new faith.”
She confesses, “I couldn’t live well without regularly reading God’s Word.”
Every. Single. Day.
Should you find yourself saying, “Yeah, that’s all well and good, but I don’t have time for that.” I challenge you to simply give it a try. You’ll be surprised when you give God your first few minutes of the day, somehow your minutes and hours are more plentiful. Just try it. (You can also get some more ideas from this: “BUT I DON’T HAVE TIME FOR A BIBLE STUDY”)
Every. Single. Day.
‘Til next time!