Feast on This!

As I was reading my devotion, the following words just leaped off the page;:

16 Let joy be your continual feast.  

 17 Make your life a prayer

. 18 And in the midst of everything be always giving thanks, for this is God’s perfect plan for you in Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 TPT

I separated these verses, because each verse is a virtual lyric of beauty! Think of a great banquet feast, not loaded with succulent meats and fresh fruit, but with JOY! Joy filled to the brim of our being and overflowing – not interrupted by the need to count calories, only feasting on the wonderful ways of God! And while you’re feasting, your life is intertwined with prayer. The environment is perfect, bathed in praise and thanksgiving!

The beautiful prose in The Passion Translation speaks to a celebration that never ends. And isn’t this the prescribed life of the believer? Jesus said:

But I have come to  give you everything in abundance,  

 more than you expect —life in its fullness until you overflow!  John 1-:10b

This is in the red! Jesus did not die for us to have a life of drudgery and pain. While we dwell in a fallen world that brings these things, there is a place where we can appropriate kingdom living no matter what the circumstances. It is the place described in 1 Thessalonians 5, shown above. That place is a well of living water that transcends earthly circumstances – for it flows from the very heart of God to our heart, a well that satan cannot enter. Spring up oh well, Father let it flow!

Maria