| “As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me” (John 6:57). |
| As I write some of these meditations, the summer Olympics are going on in Tokyo, Japan in the year 2021. Many athletes from different nations are competing, but one thing is common to all of them. Over the past few years, they have been very careful about what they eat, in order to build strong bodies that can compete in their particular sport. Also, sports differ as to proper dietary requirements. Those like heavyweight boxers, wrestlers, weightlifters, etc. will tend to eat a lot of calories, much of it in the form of protein, while runners and swimmers will eat much lighter meals, especially on the day they are going to race. |
| Perhaps more important, they will avoid things that they know will harm their bodies, and perhaps slow them down. One girl confessed that it was very hard for her to avoid eating pizza, as it is one of her favorite foods. Yet she willingly stops eating it, in order to be able to race well. All Olympic competitors avoid foods high in simple sugars, such as doughnuts and candy, but almost all eat avocados in some form or other. |
| It is much the same in the Christian life. If we include in our diet such things as “spiritual junk food,” it will impair our spiritual health. Spiritual junk food can include things such as light reading, surfing the internet for spiritual help, listening constantly to the wrong kind of music on earbuds, spending hours on Facebook, etc. Even some kinds of Christian reading can be junk food because it occupies us mainly with ourselves, instead of with Christ. All this will tend to spoil our appetites for good spiritual food. |
| As we see in our verse above, feeding on Christ is the proper food of the Christian, and it does not require a diploma in nutrition to know how to do it. The enjoyment of Christ in our hearts comes from feeding on Him as the bread of life. It is feeding on Him that nourishes our souls properly and gives us the energy to live for His glory. That is why it is so important to read the Word of God every day, just as we eat every day. |
