The Best of the Portals of Prayer

Read: Hebrews 3:7-19 / Psalm 26

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord God, when I will send a famine on the land – not a famine of bread … but of hearing the words of the Lord.”
Amos 8:11

A Threat of Famine

Most of us do not understand how devastating a famine can be. Millions of people today live their short lives in hunger and die miserably of starvation. If we could understand their tragedy, we would do more to share our bread with them. Our text refers to another kind of famine. It is a word of judgement. The day would come to disobedient Israelites when they would no longer have God’s Word. It is always a spiritually dangerous practice for people who have God’s Word to grow indifferent to it, to ignore and despise it, to reject it in unbelief. Spiritual starvation is a dreadful judgement of God on people who harden their hearts against His Word. This is a serious warning for our generation, when it appears that many people reared as Christian no longer have time or interest for the reading of the Scriptures or for participation in worship services. Many are approaching a famine of hearing God’s Word. Spiritual death is setting in, and they do not realize it. We must guard against this trend of tuning out God. Let us listen to the Good Shepherd. Let us pray that God’s Word may reach our world today and that spiritual famine be averted among us.
Speak to us, O Lord, and grant us Your grace to believe Your Word. Amen.

March 09, 1972