Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
I love this verse in and of itself, but I love it even more when you attach it to the one that's right before it. The verse right before it talks about how we give a sacrifice of praise to God with lips that are fruitful from what we know and understand God to be in our lives. It's pointing to this fact that we are to praise our Maker. We praise God with our lips. Then the verse we have for today says, and don't forget to do good for others.
Faith Beyond Ourselves
The reason those two are important together is sometimes, if we're not careful, our faith in Jesus and our pursuit of Him here on earth can be really focused on our individual experience with Him, whether that's in our devotions or time of prayer, maybe in our Bible study, or even what we're doing here together today. It becomes about us connecting with Him, and then that's it.
I love how these successive verses are attached to one another. There should be a sacrifice of praise with our lips to God. We should be offering praises to Him, and those times of praise and prayer in connection with God should lead to an expression of good things that happen for those that are around us.
The Dead Sea
It's almost like God is saying to us in these verses in the book of Hebrews, that it's not just for us to be like the Dead Sea in our experience with Him. I don't know if you know about the Dead Sea, but it is a body of water that has no tributaries. What that means is it's contained, and it's a salt body of water, so that salt concentration is so dense that you are unable to stay underwater. The buoyancy of that water is so high that it causes you to float so easily on top of it.
The reason that the Dead Sea is like this is there's nothing flowing through it. Not only does it lead to this ability to float on top, but nothing can live inside of that water. It can't sustain life with that high salt concentration. It needs there to be some oxygen and life flowing. The water needs to be running.
Living Water Flowing Through Us
When I read these verses, especially our verse for today, it reminds me that me doing good and sharing with those in need is a product of the waters running in my own life—that I'm engaging with the way of Jesus through my times of devotion, prayer, scripture, and worship. That's leading me to live out of the truth of what comes from knowing Jesus.
In a real practical sense, I think so many times we get busy in our day to day lives, and we're doing everything we can just to sustain our regular rhythms. This simple reminder to just say, hey, don't forget to do good for others, is a great prompt for us today to maybe say, where on my walk, where on my journey can I inject a little bit of love for someone else that might be a blessing and point to the hope of Jesus through my life?
I hope this verse is encouraging to us as we think about the rest of our day and how we live around other people.
