VS. March 19, 2025 Devotional
by David Joynt on March 19, 2025
EZEKIEL 16:49 | 49 This was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy.
Gluttony can create a sybaritic bubble, a luxurious world of sensation. Pleasure is so personal and immediate that it draws us inward, focusing our energies on ourselves. Regular over-indulgence heads to self-indulgence.
Ezekiel’s sharp prophetic eyes notice a side effect of gluttony—we become insensitive to the needs and the plight of others. I was struck once in Malawi by the generosity of a young child. She lived in a mud hut with her grandmother and two younger children, and attended a school our church had helped build. She’d only eaten nsima, a porridge made from maize. We brought small chocolate bars as gifts. She’d never had one! When I handed it to her, she immediately broke it in tiny pieces to share with her siblings and granny. Somehow radical generosity was more apparent in a culture of scarcity than one of abundance.
Have you ever lived in the bubble?
Gracious God,
Help me to be mindful of the needs of others. May I use every opportunity to bless and share.
Amen.
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