Nehi Soda

One night over the weekend I awoke in the dark and found my mind continually revolving around the scripture we talked about last Friday.  The King James Version of I Thessalonians 5:24 reads: “Faithful is he that calleth (or invites) you, who also will do it.”  I think that the Lord was just reinforcing in me the unfailing truth of that promise.  A few hours later when I got up for the day, I went into the study and reviewed the notes on that verse that I had taken on Friday morning.

At the bottom of my page I had drawn a purple box around a comment made by Matthew Henry in his Concise Commentary for that particular portion of scripture.  It stated: “We need no more to make us happy, than to know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He is an ever-flowing and an over-flowing fountain of grace to supply all our wants.”  What more could we desire or need than an experiential and personal knowledge of the over-flowing grace of God in and through our lives.

I vividly remember an event when I was in fifth or sixth grade that exemplifies the feeling of Matthew Henry’s comment.  During that time I had been attending St. Eugene’s Parochial School and had been faithfully serving as an altar boy for three years (Altar boys are young men who assist the Priest during church services).  In the spring the church and school administration decided on honoring all the altar boys with a fun day of movies, fun and food in the parish hall.

I can still recall watching the old Pink Panther movie with Peter Sellers playing the hilarious and bumbling role of Inspector Clouseau, chasing after friends throughout the hall and across the adjacent playground, eating an untold number of hotdogs, each individually wrapped in white paper and stored in seemingly bottomless warming trays set out on long tables in one corner of the room, but most of all, I have fond memories of being able to drink from an endless supply of cold and delicious Nehi sodas cooling in huge galvanized buckets loaded with ice!  I am not quite sure of how many grape and bright green lime sodas I consumed that day, but I know that I felt like I had died and went to heaven!  (Do you know that at one time there were at least 22 different flavors of Nehi soda?)

You have to understand that while my two siblings and I were always well provided for, our family lived on a fairly tight budget.  When we had special treats at home they were usually measured in quantity and the soda in the refrigerator normally bore the local discount store label.  At first I felt a little guilty and kept asking for permission to have another hot dog or soda, but after a while I finally got passed my preconceived ideas and yielded to what the teachers and volunteer Mom’s helping out said when they repeatedly told me: “Yes, you can have all you want!”  After that I dove in with gusto and enjoyed my newly found freedoms to the full extent of the blessing presented to us!

Those never ending Nehi sodas were just like God’s “ever-flowing and over-flowing fountain of grace” available to us in our lives.  Previous experiences may at first limit our participation in the blessing that has been given to us, but once the understanding of what our heavenly Father has provided for us through His Son comes, we are released to enjoy this unique, new found freedom in our lives.  But it is not just a one-time event like my hot dog and soda day was back in the mid 1960’s.  We can come to expect God’s over-flow of grace in every situation in our lives!

Remember that He is true to His Word.  He is faithful and WILL DO what He says He will do for us!  This is definitely something that you don’t want to forget.  If you need to, make a note, or get something that helps you to keep the understanding of God’s faithfulness within your sight.  Nehi soda is still around today, but has been repackaged with a modern label and plastic bottle.  The new packaging doesn’t really do much for me, but when I see a picture of or an old glass bottle of Nehi, I immediately remember that day back in elementary school and of how it reminds me of the “ever-flowing and over-flowing” grace of God working in, for and through me!  Hummm, I can remember the taste of that bright green lime soda even as I write this today!  I think I’ll go online and order some retro bottles of Nehi soda!  Have a blessed day that is over-flowing in the grace of God.  Stay in tune to His Word, and keep asking yourself… “What am I expecting today?”