Hungry for More
Scripture Reading — James 1:16-25
“Other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop —a hundred … times what was sown.”
Matthew 13:8
At the mission conference that I mentioned yesterday, we were able to hand out almost 20,000 booklets and CD/DVDs to Christians from China. At times there were long lines of people waiting for materials. I had not seen anything like that before; spiritual hunger was obviously present.
Afterward I wondered why we do not see this more often. Maybe we have forgotten the apostle Peter’s advice to be “like newborn babies,” who “crave pure spiritual milk” (1 Peter 2:2). Maybe we think that because we have heard it before, we know it already. But that would be a big mistake. We would be assuming that we don’t need to grow in Christ (see 2 Peter 3:18).
James urges us to “humbly accept the word planted in you” and to “do what it says.” We can’t do what the Word of God says, though, if we don’t read from it, hear it preached, and learn what it means for our lives. Hebrews 4:12 says, “The word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit … it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” God’s Word can make us really uncomfortable at times. Like a mirror, it can show us clearly who we are. But we need that.
Have you read the Bible today? What have you learned about God and about yourself?
Father, thank you for giving us your Word. Help us to develop an appetite for it, to learn from it always, and to put it into practice every day. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
About the author — Jimmy Tai-On Lin
Rev. Jimmy Lin is the Chinese ministry leader of The Back to God Hour. With his staff in Palos Heights and Hong Kong, Rev. Lin has ministered to over 1.3 billion Chinese-speaking people around the world for 16 years through radio, literature, CD/DVD, Internet, and text message. His wife, Doris, is one of the translators of Today into the Chinese language, which now has a circulation of more than 45,000 copies.
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