Jeremiah 23:29  Is not my word like as a fire? saith the LORD; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?  When I was a child, my dad taught us boys about the power and potential destruction of fire.  We lived on an old farm.  Dad worked so hard to clean the place up.  We would carry brush, sticks, and all kinds of debris and pile it up in a huge pile.  Dad poured gas in the middle and all around the perimeter.   Then he carefully poured a little stream across the ground far away from the brush pile.   Then after removing the gas can from the scene,  he pitched a match into the little stream of gas.  I remember watching it travel along the ground toward the brush…then… a powerful explosion!  The brush was dry and in no time was consumed.  God’s word is powerful as well.  It can consume the dross in our lives while purifying at the same time!  Jeremiah was faced with the temptation to quit, throw in the towel so to speak.  Hear this… Jeremiah 20:9 Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.
It was the Word of God that got me started on this journey,  it is the Word of God that keeps me going on this journey,  and I trust the same Word of God will help me finish this journey.   Paul said… 2 Timothy 4:7  I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:  By the grace of God I’d like to go out the same way, what about you?  Pastor