A Little Yellow Sponge

If you have lived in Alaska for at least a year, you know that even though we get a good amount of snow in the winter and rain the rest of the year, Alaska is an arid place. It is a fact that during the winter the moisture gets sucked right out of your body.

Coming from the South, where humidity abounds, we were surprised upon our arrival in Alaska that two food staples, Oreo cookies nor potato chips needed to be sealed to keep them from being” soggified” from the humidity! You could just leave the bag open, and the cookies were still crisp the next day! However incredible that was, there was a downside for musical instruments, especially guitars. To my astonishment, I found out early that my guitar needed a humidifier. A guitar humidifier sits in the soundhole of your guitar. It is a very simple but necessary item to keep your guitar from warping. It consists of a small yellow sponge that you sock with water, which in turn sits in a wedge-shaped plastic container that has numerous small holes. This allows for the water vapor coming from the sponge to keep the inside of the guitar humidified, which in turn keeps your guitar neck and body from being ravished by the moisture-sucking environment in which we live.

But, if you don’t check on that yellow sponge every day or so, you might eventually have some problems. You see that little yellow sponge can’t stay moist unless you put it under the faucet every other day or so. It needs a good soaking. And by the way, you can easily forget about that little yellow sponge, sitting there in your guitar, in your guitar case. Unless you take that guitar out of your case and play it every day. Days, and sometimes a week, can go by before you even think about that little yellow sponge in there. And if that continues, your guitar will be ruined. It will not sound right or play well.

I think our lives are like that. There are times we feel all dried up inside. Our faith, our heart, and our soul, like that little yellow sponge, need a good soaking on a regular basis.

How often do we neglect to open God’s Word and read, to pray? As Christians, we need to be intentional when it comes to our “little yellow sponges”, our hearts, our minds, our faith. Pay attention daily, check it, soak it good with God’s Word, and with solid Christian friendships.

Psalm 42–43 tells of this dried-up feeling. Three times these very words are used by the Psalmist.