Roots

Proverbs 12:3

Wickedness never brings stability,

but the godly have deep roots.

The conifer trees forming a hedge at the end of our garden are being condemned to the history books!

Nearest and dearest has long been on their case and on Friday our friend arrived armed with 2 chainsaws and removed the tops, leaving 4ft stumps in the ground.

A great deal of graft went into revealing the roots, because they went deep and had grown thickly in all directions.

It took an axe, chainsaw, crowbar and two men rocking the stump to and fro many times before a tap root broke and some of the stumps could be removed.

What's the point of this illustration?

It's essential that we develop deep roots going down into Jesus and His Word! Especially now when trials are coming thick and fast in the world.

Satan's demise is closer than ever before and he wants to take as many as possible to destruction with him.

Therefore all his tools are in play: the axe of death and disease, the crowbar of debt and poverty, the chainsaw of doubt and fear - add to that the rocking to and fro of human betrayals.

Ultimately our safety and salvation are in God's hands, but the onus is on us to not neglect our roots of prayer and saturation in God's Word.

There was a tragic story in the news recently, where a young mother left her 20 month old daughter alone in her flat for 6 days, without food and water, to go partying to celebrate her 18th birthday.

When she returned her daughter had died. The coroner's recorded the cause of death as neglect. How tragic!

Neglect is a insidious process. There is no intentional action. It is based on inaction.

If we neglect our roots of attachments to Christ, we may find that our faith is in danger.

We must tend and carefully look after the great gift that Jesus has freely bestowed on us.

Prayer, fellowship and study of God's Word are essential - like food and water to our soul.

Without it we slowly die and wither spiritually.

1 John 3:1-3

See how very much our Father loves us, for He calls us His children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know him. Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but He has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like Him, for we will see Him as he really is. And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as He is pure.