When I pray, and talk with our Father it seems like some times He gives me a comparison of something physical, to something spiritual. Sometimes the things used in comparison are rather odd, but a point is made anyway.

As I sat in the bed this morning talking to our Heavenly Father, He put the picture of a dried out old yellowish faded sponge in my mind. Then I saw one drop of water on it, at the spot where the water was, it was a pale green, and it was soft. Below is what was put in my mind about it.

When one takes a new sponge out of a package it is all soft, new looking and is a joy to use. Pretty soon the beautiful color fades, and after it is laid aside for a while it looks awful, is dried out, and hard. It is still usable, and one can clean, wipe up spills, and use it for many things, after it has been made soft again.

If we took that hard sponge, and put one drop of water on it, that wee little space would be soft. We can keep adding drops making the soft area bigger and bigger, or we can just emerge the whole thing in liquid and get it over with all at once.

Our life started out like the new sponge in the package. We were born, nice, fresh, and un-used so to speak. Then in life we became so to speak faded, and dried out because of how we lived our life.

At some point when our Father called us it was like one drop of liquid put on the sponge. If we yielded to the softening of it, He added another drop. It was His Spirit that He was using to call us, was the drop of water, living water that was softening a spot in dried up lives. As we yielded He added more and more drops.

When we repented of what caused our life to be all dried up, accepted Him fully, and was baptized in water, then He would baptize this dried up life with His Spirit, and get us all wet, just like we plunged the sponge into a bucket of water to get it all wet. This sponge was filled with water, now we became filled with His Spirit. We became usable for doing a righteous work He called us to do.

There is one difference though. That old sponge would still be faded and dirty looking from all the use it had gone through. When it dried out it would be hard again. We on the other hand would become soft and pliable, our out look would be fresh. Our way of living would be changed. Our hearts would be changed. Our whole life would not be the same anymore in many respects. It would be like we were a new being. There is one thing that is the same though. If we dry up of having the Holy Spirit in our lives, we too, will be dried up old sponges again.

© 4/02/98 E-mail, Mary Bierman < mlbierman@oocities.com > Not for sale. May be used freely if this information is attached to the article. Please notify me if you use this article.