“You shall therefore PUT these words of mine on your heart and on your soul; and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall TEACH them to your sons, talking of them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall WRITE them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your sons may be multiplied on the land which the LORD swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens remain above the earth” (Deut 11:18-21).
Growing up in a Jewish home, there was always a mezuzah on my door post. But the sacred words inside the mezuzah (which in Hebrew means door post) were millions of miles away from my heart. I had no desire to teach and/or write God’s word because it hadn’t yet been written upon my heart. So how did God’s word finally become real and personal to me? When I finally realized God’s word wouldn’t stick until I first applied a bright red primer (an under coat of paint) to the door posts of my heart!
“You shall take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood which is in the basin, and apply some of the blood that is in the basin to the lintel and the two doorposts; and none of you shall go outside the door of his house until morning. For the LORD will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and when He sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the LORD will pass over the door and will not allow the destroyer to come in to your houses to smite you” (Exod 12:22-23).
For the precious blood of the lamb is the only primer strong enough to make God’s word and a love for his commandments stick to our hearts!
“Knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ…. Therefore, putting aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord” (1 Pet 1:18-19; 2:1-3).
