Treasure

Our doorbell was broken. It’s not your usual kind of electric doorbell. It’s a real little bell on a bracket by the front door. It has a little ‘dinger’ with a weighted string attached to it so that callers can ring it. Its high-pitched ‘ting’ can be easily heard anywhere in the house.

But one day the string got broken and the little weight that kept it hanging well was lost.

In the garage I have a box of bits of wood left over from some project or other that ‘might come in useful one day’. There I found a small piece of oak cut off from one of the legs of a little table I was making for Sue. I carved it into a weight for the bell-pull. But it wouldn’t be heavy enough. So, I rummaged in a tin where I kept all sorts of unused nuts and bolts and washers. I found a bolt that I cut down to size and a washer that fitted it and screwed them into the oak to make it heavier. I found some varnish left over from something else. Sue found an unused bootlace, and there we were. It only took a few minutes more and the bell was fixed – TING!

These bits and pieces were treasure to me. In our walk with God we have so much opportunity to learn new things. But how important it is to keep using the old things that God has shown us from His word; things, maybe, from long ago that are still essential for us today.

Recently I found myself just skimming through a passage of the bible that I knew very well, not really concentrating on what I was reading because it was so familiar. I felt God saying something like this: “Richard, how do you know that I haven’t got just what you need now out of what you think is so old?”

Yes, of course God wants us to enjoy new things from Him. But, so often, what is old is just what we need to mend something in us that is in need of repair now.

Prayer: Father, thank You so much for the treasure chest of Your word. I’m sorry for the times when ‘familiarity has bred contempt’. Lord, would You open the ears of my heart that I may receive from You everything, whether it is new or old to me, that You want me to take into my life today. Amen.