Few people I know are as passionate about the Word of God as Wendy Speake. As an author, Bible teacher, and leader of the annual online 40-Day Sugar Fast, she has long led the way in calling us to give up the things that never truly satisfy and turn to the only One who can make us whole. In her new book, The 40-Day Feast, she invites us to truly taste and see the goodness of God’s Word by learning to dig deep into the Scriptures and apply them for ourselves. It’s a grace to welcome Wendy to the farm’s table today…

Guest Post by Wendy Speake

In my jewelry box are small tokens of love, given to me mostly by my husband and my mother over the years. I value them greatly and wear them regularly.

But within that box is something I prize most of all; not a pendant of gold, but something much more valuable: the torn and partially eaten corner of a thin Bible page.

When my firstborn child was only a few months old, he was rolling around and batting at toys as I sat beside him, reading my Bible on the living room floor. Without warning, my baby boy rolled onto his side, stretched out his chubby hand, and ripped out part of the page I was reading.

In one fluid motion, he shoved it into his slobbery mouth. Quickly, I reached in after it, pulled it out, wiped it off, and attempted to flatten it. Eighteen years later, that torn Bible page is taped to the inside of my jewelry box, and it is more valuable than anything else in residence beside it. No rubies, diamonds, or gold can compare.

Speaking of gold, before my son ate that page, I had used a golden highlighter to mark these words: “Turn to me and have mercy on me; show your strength in behalf of your servant; save me, because I serve you just as my mother did” (Ps. 86:16 NIV).

How beautiful the irony.

Of all the pages and all the prayers, this was what my baby grabbed and ate.

Today, I pray that my infant son’s literal example inspires us greatly. All day long we stuff our mouths and stuff our eyes and ears and stuff our minutes and our days with just about anything we can get our hands on. But nothing else, save the Word of God, can save us; and nothing else can satisfy or sanctify us either.

Nothing else, save the Word of God, can save us; and nothing else can satisfy or sanctify us either.

God called us all out on this one through the prophet Jeremiah when he said, “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water” (Jer. 2:13 NIV).

I can’t be the only one who knows it’s true.

We all tend to go from one broken cistern to another. We run from sugar high to sugar high instead of turning to The Most High. With a phone in one hand and a fork in the other, we consume all day long, but never let His Word consume our lives. We don’t have the time to ingest our Bibles. And if we do ingest them, we don’t know how to digest them—to understand and apply them to our lives.

So we take ourselves back to those broken wells, utterly weary and heavy laden. On the backside of another caffeine crash we hop on over to Amazon Prime, or we hop in our car and drive to Target, only to miss the bullseye, again.

As we pinpoint our wayward tendencies and follow my son’s literal example, it is my hope that you commit again, here at the start of another year, to prioritize time at the table, feasting on God’s Word, that you might taste the sweetness of God for yourself.

We were made for more. We were made for God. And our Bibles are where we find Him.

Oh, He is good, and His Word is true. Yet many miss out entirely because not all Bible-believing men and women are Bible-reading men and women. As a result, we’re a malnourished bunch.

The irony of being spiritually malnourished is that many of us are also overfed on cultural junk food. We are consumers who overeat and overdrink by bingeing shows and social media, online shopping and retail therapy, video gaming and YouTube watching. But none of those things have ever worked to fill our holes and make us whole—or holy.

When we turn to food and drink, screens and shopping, to meet our deepest needs, we end up unsatisfied and hungrier than ever. We are a generation of consumers who never learned to consume God’s Word. We scroll through our phones and scour our cabinets, hungry for something to satisfy, but nothing we find there ever does. We were made for more. We were made for God. And our Bibles are where we find Him.


Only in our Bibles will we find the help, hope, and healing we’re desperate for.
In our Bibles we find light for the path we’re on and bread for the day ahead.
In the pages of God’s holy communication, we encounter not only conviction but transformation—and grace.
In our Bibles we taste the sweetness of grace, the very goodness of God’s redemptive love.

Only in our Bibles will we find the help, hope, and healing we’re desperate for.

As we feast on His forgiveness, we find ourselves forgiven and forgiving.
As we open up our Bibles, we discover not only the message but the Messenger—the book but also the Author.
As we read, believe what we read, and confess it with our lips as our own belief, the Holy Spirit, who wrote the Word and dwells in it, lifts off the page and then drops into our hearts like a deposit.

He opens our minds to understand that our sins are forgiven, then gives us the strength to stop sinning. It’s all there, from Genesis to Revelation. All we have to do is consume it.

Long before baby Caleb put that Bible page in his little mouth, God instructed others to eat His words. The very same prophet I mentioned above also said, “Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by your name, O LORD, God of hosts” (Jer. 15:16 ESV).

Here at the start of another year, consider this your invitation to the table where God’s Word is set. Nothing else can satisfy your hungry heart. It’s time to feast!


Adapted from Chapter 10, pages 59-62 of The 40-Day Feast by Wendy Speake.

Wendy Speake is a trained actress and heartfelt Bible teacher who ministers to hearts through storytelling and biblical life application. As host of the annual online 40-Day Sugar Fast, she invites men and women to set down their sugary treats and FEAST on the sweetness of God’s Word every January. In her new book, The 40-Day Feast, Wendy offers her Jesus-hungry friends an additional forty courses to whet their appetites for more of His sweet and satisfying, saving and sanctifying Word!

The question Wendy dares you to consider is: Are you ready to get hungry for God’s Word? Are you willing to feast on your Bible instead of the fluff and false-fillers we all tend to culturally consume? From Starbucks to Target, Amazon Prime to Netflix, we are a generation of overfed, spiritually malnourished consumers. It’s time to get hungry for the only thing that can satisfy and save!

Join Wendy for The 40-Day Feast this Lent! Set down what it is that you typically turn to so that you might turn (or return) to Him. This is your invitation to taste and see just how good He is! Find out more at wendyspeake.com/feast.


[ Our humble thanks to Baker Books for their partnership in today’s devotional. ]