The Power to Save Your Soul
James 1:21 Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. (NRSV)
To be sure, some of the things that God has to say are at the very least inconvenient and often downright offensive to our worldly sensibilities. So when you run into one of those passages in the Bible, how do you respond?
If only God would just let us toddle along on our own merry way, following our whims and desires and when needed, step in to give us a helping hand. If the truth be known, that’s often how we think. Perhaps not out loud, but certainly deep down. And then you run into a passage like this one:
James 1:21Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. (NRSV)
He’s not mincing words with us here. Another way to read that would be moral filth and superabundant depravity. We all have that dark, sinful nature tucked away inside. And every now and then, when we’re put under pressure, it raises its ugly head and we’re left wondering, where did that come from?
Maybe you find that it happens again and again, almost as though you don’t have any control over it. Great! God’s telling me to put away all that filthiness and rampant wickedness, but how? Well, the “how” comes in the second part of the verse: receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your soul.
A powerful, transformative, life-changing transaction takes place when we receive the Word of God with an open, humble heart. Did you catch it? It saves our souls. It sets us free. It restores us back into the image of God in which we were created.
Those difficult, inconvenient, even offensive passages of Scripture have been put there by God to save your soul. Receive them in meekness.
That’s His Word. Fresh … for you … today.
Blessed by this devotion?
Share it with a friend!
Respond