Every Day Light One Year Devotional Daily Inspiration

Here are 365 daily reflections by Selwyn Hughes organized into six themes and complemented by a special Bible reading guide for added insights.

Day One

"Fresh Water!"
"When it empties into the Sea, the water there becomes fresh." (v.8)
For reading & meditation – Ezekiel 47:1–12

Our subject is a challenging but deeply inspiring one – Staying Spiritually Fresh. The idea for this theme arose out of a letter I received some time ago which said: "Over the past year or so, my Christian life has become stale – insufferably so. I have lost the freshness and spontaneity I once knew. Can you say something that will help bring back the sparkle into my Christian experience? What is the remedy?"

I want to introduce you to twelve principles which, when put into practice, will enable you to maintain spiritual freshness even though around you all may be stale and arid. They have worked for me for over forty years – I believe they will also work for you. But can we expect always to live in a state of spiritual alertness and freshness? Isn’t that being unrealistically optimistic? Well, what does Scripture say? It shows that the people of God are meant to be beautiful gardens in the midst of a dry desert. The prophet Isaiah puts it like this: "And you shall be like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters fail not" (Isa. 58:11, Amplified Bible).

In our text for today, Ezekiel speaks of the river flowing "into the Dead Sea, into the brackish waters which shall turn fresh" (Moffatt). How thrilling. The river of God flowing into our dead seas turns them fresh. Whatever reasons there are for our lives becoming spiritually stale, it is quite clear from Scripture that they need not be so. God offers to exchange His strength daily for our weakness, His freshness for our staleness. Let’s go for it.

Prayer

My Father and my God, I come at the beginning of these meditations to ask that You will make my life like a watered garden. Let Your fresh rivers run into my dead seas so that my whole being is revived – day after day after day. Amen.