Yes, the flour made the stew safe for eating. We’re not told exactly how this happened, but it was certainly a miracle. Possibly the flour drew all the poison from the gourds to itself and left nothing but healthy stew in the pot.
Now, what does this story have to do with you and me and more specifically the addiction to media that we have had?
Think for a moment about your answer to question number 1 above, about how media worked its way all through our lives until it had taken over and had become harmful to us. Our involvement with media started small but eventually it spread to where we became consumed with it. Like the poison that worked its way through the whole stew.
And what is the solution? Do we look at each individual thing we are doing with media and stop it? Well, we could, but that wouldn’t really solve the problem, and we’d only end up frustrated.
Instead, we need to put something better into our lives to sort things out. We need to put Jesus into our lives! Just like the men in the story above were not told to try to take the poison out but rather to put substance (flour) in, so if we find that something has consumed our lives, we can overcome it through adding in substance: Jesus.
On the cross Jesus took all our sins on Himself, drew all the poison out of us and took to be His very own. “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that we, removed from sins, might live for righteousness. “By His wounds you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24 NIV). In taking all our sins, He left eternal life and eternal pleasures for all who believe.
The following passage is a man by the name of John the Baptist who was speaking to his followers. Notice what he said about Jesus:
Matthew 3:11 NLT “I baptize with water those who repent of their sins and turn to God. But someone is coming soon who is greater than I am—so much greater that I’m not worthy even to be his slave and carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.
Did you notice that one of the things Jesus Christ does is baptize us with the Holy Spirit and with fire? What does that mean?
To be baptized means to be immersed. So Jesus’ mission is to immerse us in the Holy Spirit. Picture a man completely under the water, totally immersed in it, and that is what Jesus came to do with all who believe. We become totally immersed in Him.
And then it says He will baptize us with fire. What does that mean?
Well, fire in the Bible is a purifying element. You’ve probably heard the phrase “purified by fire.” This is what Jesus does to us spiritually. He works in our hearts to burn away all the stuff in our lives that isn’t glorifying to God or good for us.
So believers become, over time, totally immersed in Jesus, baptized in Him, consumed in Him, and cleansed and purified by Him. Going through these various trials and the purification by the Spirit will result in great joy and praise. This will end in an entirely enjoyable experience, though there may be stress from the trials and testings we go through. The result is that Jesus begins to take over every aspect of our lives, filling our hearts with love, giving us a joy that can’t even be put into words (read about it in 1 Peter 1:6-9). This is what we were designed for: to be filled with Christ.
So we are to add Jesus in, and watch Him begin to consume us and purify us. Rather than taking media out, we can put Jesus, the “substance” (Colossians 2:17 AMP) in. We can do this in all kinds of ways:
We can read our Bibles through applications on our phones or tablets,
study through lessons at Setting Captives Free,
watch YouTube videos of gospel centered sermons or worship music,
go to gospel promoting websites,
attend a gospel preaching church.
or blog, chat, or tweet with others about the gospel.
One of the things I’ve gotten a lot of pleasure from is this: download E-Sword then go to “Tools” and then “Sermon Audio” and start listening to some faith building sermons. All of this becomes tremendously captivating in a very wonderful way. Pretty soon we notice that our “taste buds” for media are changing, our desires are becoming more and more for Jesus and less and less for time-wasting media. This is exciting, thrilling even.
Question 5. What did you learn today, and how will you begin to implement it in your life? Please share your thoughts:
Log in / create an account to enroll or continue where you left off.
Tomorrow, we are going to look at what really happened on the cross: we were rescued from media addiction!