Oops ... where's the baby!"

While growing up I remember hearing the saying, “Be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater!” As you can tell, it memorably stuck with me. Recently I learned the earliest record of it goes way back to 1512 Germany, in Appeal to Fools, an interesting title to a writing.

It’s a catchphrase that in essence warns how in our eagerness to rid ourself of something not wanted or liked, if we’re not careful we can inadvertently discard something of essential value that is obscured in the mix.

Sadly, that is what too many of us inadvertently do with the invaluable gift God gave us when He came in human form to reveal who He was and is, from a place that is currently unseen with our physical eyes but can be known through our spiritual nature. Knowing and believing what He revealed is essential for us to be prepared for what happens when we physically die in this life and step into this currently unseen spiritual realm to which we too are connected.

The bathwater of the catchphrase fits well how bad experiences, misconceptions, wrong teaching and thinking about God and His Word, can so badly contaminate the pure water he brings us, in our eagerness to rid ourselves of what we come to see as offensive, unwanted ideas in our life, all we want to do is reject them as useless contaminants and toss them all out of our life! —mistakenly along with the essential truths God came to tell us about too.

He came in the form of Jesus, who (coincidentally?) among other things is also called, “The water of life”. My hope is to encourage you to go directly to the source of His pure water yourself, which we can find in the first four books of the New Testament, along with the writings of some of His closest disciples who were first hand witnesses of His life, death and resurrection. Take your time to seek and get to know Him and His teachings before tossing out the muddied water in your life, so you won’t accidently toss out with it the most valuable thing ever given, His message of hope – of a permanent home with our heavenly Father, God himself, and the rest of His family adopted by Him because they too believed his message and followed Him.

Drink deep of HIS water, and that which tries to substitute for it in this world will never satisfy the same again.