Roots by the River

by Jim Wilson Many years ago my wife and I heard a message that we took very much to heart. It was preached at our wedding. The message had been given first more than 3,000 years earlier to a people who did not take it to heart. It was part of Moses’ final talk to the new generation. "Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your children may be many in the land that the LORD swore to give your forefathers, as many as the days that the heavens are above the earth." (Deuteronomy 11:18-21) There was very little application of this teaching by the people of Israel in the Old Testament. I have also observed hundreds of Christians, senior to me, contemporary to me a