I was on the phone with my wife, Sheryl. She was describing a situation to me  - She had decided to rake up all the dead leaves in our front yard and burn them. She loaded our burn barrel and started the fire. Some of the flames fell out and started little fires around the barrel. She took a hose and began putting out the fires  -  but then the hose slowed to a trickle, then quit altogether.  She and our daughter Kari grabbed a few buckets, ran back and forth into the house, filling the buckets, till the fires were out.

So as she's telling me all this, the Holy Spirit is ministering some truth to my heart. The reason the water quit flowing was -  the hose had become clogged with gunk and junk -  dead leaves and vegetation and mud. It had to be cleaned out. And so -  our hearts. We must guard our hearts and not allow gunk and junk (sins) to build up. We must spend time in the Word and let the Word spend time in us. Sheryl said the buckets represent going to church-  people get the Word and carry it back home, but it's not enough to put out the fires of hell and the fiery darts of the wicked, we need the Word daily. We need to be God's "buckets" that He can use to put out wild fires in people we meet.....taking it in, giving it out...like breathing. The world's junk (words) pollute the Word of God in us, if we swallow them enough.