“...to them gave He power to become...”
(Jn. 1:12)
I have been spending some time now in the book of John in my devotions. I’ve been impressed with three words in the above text, “....power to become.” The writer John could certainly attest to this fact. Jesus took a hothead (Mk. 3:17) and a hardhearted young man (Lk. 9:54-55), and made him into a sweet and loving old man (1 Jn. 4:7). In later years he was not what he was in earlier years. He could say, “What I was is not who I am.” Can we honestly say this of ourselves?
This is not only true of John, but also of other of the Lord’s followers. To Simon he said, “Thou art...thou shalt be,” (Jn. 1:42). The Jewish evangelist, Hyman Appleman once told his wife he wanted a little girl, three years old, like one child whom he was taken up with in one of his meetings. Her reply was, “Hyman, children don’t come that way.” As another has said, “We are what we’ve been becoming.” A good illustration is the caterpillar becoming a beautiful butterfly.
“Dead things don’t grow, only living things.”
(rds)
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