You are not microwavable

Good morning everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Sanctification”

Our Bible verse for today: “Normally it takes only eleven days to travel from Mount Sinai to Kadesh-barnea …” Deuteronomy 1:2 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “You are not microwaveable”

Deuteronomy 1:2 is commentary from Moses reminding the people that as the crow flies, their journey from captivity in Egypt to their new life in the Promised Land could have been accomplished in only eleven days. Instead, it took forty years. Why? Why did God keep them wandering in the wilderness for forty years when He could have brought them straight there in only eleven days? The answer is because they needed forty years to become people who were ready to possess the Promised Land. God spent those forty years purifying, molding, and shaping them into the people they needed to be so they would be ready to receive the promises of God.

Something similar is occurring in our own lives with respect to the middle stage of the sanctification process. It is the stage known as progressive sanctification and the very definition of “progressive” means that the change comes slowly, sequentially, steadily, over an extended period-of-time.

In the moment of salvation God could have instantly turned you into the perfected saint you will be for all eternity. But that would have circumvented the learning and growing that occurs as you are molded and shaped over time, and it would have required nothing of you. You would not have had to demonstrate your love for God or your desire to know Him better by engaging in the practices of discipleship. We appreciate our sanctification more when we have some skin in the game – when we have made the effort and done the hard work to learn, serve, and grow day-by-day over a sustained period of years.

Some of you are old enough to remember the comedian, Joan Rivers. She once did a skit on a television comedy show which was designed to spoof the impatience of modern Americans. In the skit she was cooking an instant meal in a microwave. But she was so impatient that she stood there tapping her foot, drumming her fingers on the counter, and finally she shouted at the microwave, “Hurry up!”

We Christians are sometimes like that with respect to the process of sanctification. We want microwave results, and we’re impatient for it. But God is not in a hurry, and the process of sanctification is much more like a good meal cooked slowly in a slow-cooker than it is like an instant meal in a microwave.

So, relax. This takes time. Invest the time and effort needed each day – for weeks and months and years, to continue placing yourself in a position before God every day whereby the Holy Spirit can slowly and progressively mold you and shape you into the person God is making you into.

Sorry, but you are not microwavable.

God bless,
Pastor Jim

(If you like what you’re reading in these daily devotionals, and if you would like more content from Oak Hill Baptist Church, join us on Sundays at 10:00, in-person if you are nearby or, if you are geographically distant or if you just can’t make it, online at www.YouTube.com/@oakhillbaptistcrossville

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