Watch Your Tongue…

Read: Proverbs 10-12
Marked: Proverbs 12:18, There is one who speaks like the piercings of a sword, But the tongue of the wise promotes health.

I have a choice how I speak to, or about others. I can be discouraging or encouraging. I can speak as if I’m wielding a sword, cutting, hacking, piercing friend and foe alike.

There’s too much of that going on in the world and we justify it so easily. But I can also speak words of love, healing, and affirmation of which there is little in the world.

James says I am to guard my tongue because it is a fire, a world of iniquity, an unruly evil, full of deadly poison (James 3:6, 8). That’s saying something.

I must choose how I speak to, and especially about others. God will hold me accountable for every idle word I speak (Matthew 12:36). May I always choose to speak wisely.

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Living Water…

Read: Ezekiel 46-48
Marked: Ezekiel 47:1, Then he brought me back to the door of the temple; and there was water, flowing from under the threshold of the temple toward the east, for the front of the temple faced east; the water was flowing from under the right side of the temple, south of the altar.

The image of water flowing from under the temple gives such a picture of vitality. The water brought life and healing to the Dead Sea, V8.

The waters became a great river and alongside its banks grew trees that never withered and their fruit never failed. They grew food every month and their leaves were used for medicine, V12.

Jesus is Living Water, from Whom anyone drinks will never be thirsty again. He is the source of this River. What a glorious time the millennium will be.

But I don’t want to wait till then to find life and healing from the disease of sin. I can drink from the Lord now.

Born Again…

Read: Leviticus 14-15
Marked: Leviticus 14:1-9, Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “This shall be the law of the leper for the day of his cleansing: He shall be brought to the priest. And the priest shall go out of the camp, and the priest shall examine him; and indeed, if the leprosy is healed in the leper, then the priest shall command to take for him who is to be cleansed two living and clean birds, cedar wood, scarlet, and hyssop. And the priest shall command that one of the birds be killed in an earthen vessel over running water. As for the living bird, he shall take it, the cedar wood and the scarlet and the hyssop, and dip them and the living bird in the blood of the bird that was killed over the running water. And he shall sprinkle it seven times on him who is to be cleansed from the leprosy, and shall pronounce him clean, and shall let the living bird loose in the open field. He who is to be cleansed shall wash his clothes, shave off all his hair, and wash himself in water, that he may be clean. After that he shall come into the camp, and shall stay outside his tent seven days. But on the seventh day he shall shave all the hair off his head and his beard and his eyebrows–all his hair he shall shave off. He shall wash his clothes and wash his body in water, and he shall be clean.

The sacrificial bird was killed in an earthen vessel under running water and its blood applied to the living bird, the cedar wood, the scarlet, and the hysop, V5 and 6.

This is such a wonderful picture of Christ the King (represented by the royal colour scarlet) who, though God, became a man (earthen vessel), and died shedding His blood for me, a sinner, though He Himself was sinless (clean, running water).

All these symbols pointed to the reality of the crucifixion of Jesus (blood, water, cedar [cross], and hysop) when He died.

When Jesus was speared, water and blood flowed from His body. His blood cleanses the sinner and set them free from sin and death, V8, and the sinner is born again (shaving of body hair), V8 and 9.