Whole Wheat or White?

Many years ago, I moved my family to eating whole wheat bread. My children where small back then, but they could still express their opinion on the change! I would especially hear about it when they would come back from a friend’s house, “At their house, they have that soft, white bread! The kind that bounces back when you touch it. Why do we have to be so weird?”

Jesus tells us in John 6:35, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.” So what type of bread is He? Whole wheat or white?

Jesus is anything but soft, easy to chew and what every family is eating. He can be rough, solid, weighty, and against the norm. Those who decide to go with the soft, will themselves become soft. They may appear to be ok on the outside, but inside, things are slowly breaking down.

A couple of weeks ago, Greg and I were getting everything ready to head to Kentucky in the early morning for my family’s reunion that we have every three years. It was 8:00 p.m. when I glanced out our backyard and noticed something odd about our pool. It was still; there was no water circulating. Strange. I headed out to the pool equipment; smelling something burning as I got closer. Dreading what I would find, I felt sure the pool pump had gone out. The timing could not be worse. It had been near 100 degrees here for days and with more than a couple of days of not filtering, we would return to find our pool looking like the lake we were heading to.

I called the pool man. He said he had been getting a lot of calls from people having troubles with their pumps. Running 24 hours a day in this sweltering heat was causing many of them to overheat and give out. “Shut it off and turn it back on in the morning. Maybe it will work.” We could only hope.

Six o’clock the next morning, I headed back out to the equipment. It turned on! I was so excited; I could head out to my trip with peace.

When we returned, our pool was clear, blue and good as ever.

Over the next few days, I would look out of my window. My pool would be still one minute and then running a few hours later. I was hoping I had messed up the timer and foolishly waited a couple of days to check on it. Yesterday, I looked out of my window; the water was still. Against my hope, the pump had overheated and shut off. I paid attention to it all day and noticed that every once in awhile the water would be circulating; then it would shut off again. Tomorrow, I have to get a new pump.

Does your walk with the Lord ever feel this way? It looks good – clear, pool, refreshing. But really, something is not quite right. On the outside, like my pool, we look good. People may think our families are good, our jobs seem to be going well, we look so pretty at church. What they don’t know, is that during the day, our pumps are shutting off, because they are overheated – burned out.

Maybe we have been taking in the “white bread”; not really chewing on the truth of the Word like we need to. His ways are not easy; living for ourselves comes so much more natural.

I woke up this morning feeling overheated and overwhelmed. Life on this planet is just downright hard sometimes. Yet, as I sit here and discipline myself to chew on the Word, I am strengthened and ready to live another day in Him. I’m calling on my Pool Man for that new pump. If you need a new pump, my friend, call on the Pool Man. He is available to you, too and He loves house calls!

Lynn

One Comment

  1. Lynn, my pump has been burned out the last few days. Living at my parents house, caring for my Dad and daily making trips to the hospital to visit my Mom is exhausting. With Dad rising very early (this morning it was 3am!!!), I’m finding that quiet time with the Lord is hard to find. I fall into bed too tired to keep my eyes open at the end of the day.

    Needing to have His life giving water flow through my pump today,
    Joy

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