What if a book could change your life? God's Word, the Bible can. It holds a great treasure. So, grab a cup of coffee and let's start our day off on the right foot.
A book for change...
Today's thought:
2 Timothy 3:16, "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."
What if a book could change your life? This is the use of Scripture, the Bible, says Paul. It is meant to be a tool for change. A tool to think God's thoughts after him. A tool to help us submit to being transformed to his likeness, a likeness that is pure righteousness (doing what is right, the opposite of sin). When we are corrected and equipped in righteousness we are being trained to be like God.
What would you pay for transformation? According to a Marketdata Enterprises market report, the U.S. self-improvement market is worth $9.6 Billion. These worldly philosophies for change are toothless dogs. They make a lot of noise but have no bite, they make no real lasting marks. The Bible says that on our own we can't change. Sin, doing what is wrong or not doing what is right, is like a force operating in us. This is Paul's point in Romans 7 and is clearest expressed in verse 21, "So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me." We cannot change ourselves. That's Paul's point. Real transformation can only come from God. And the Holy Spirit in us can accomplish that. Jesus called him our "Helper." With him in us we have the power to overcome this force of sin in us. And it is the Holy Spirit that inspired the Bible. The Helper inspired the Bible to help us, to help us achieve real change. It is the Holy Spirit that gives God's word, the Bible, life. "For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12).
To know this but for us not to read our Bible is like a man a read about in the book Amazing Grace. In the book the writer and poet Kathleen Norris shares what she calls “the scariest story” she's ever heard about the Bible. Norris and her husband were visiting a man named Arlo, a rugged, self-made man who was facing terminal cancer. During their visit, Arlo started talking about his grandfather, a sincere Christian. The grandfather gave Arlo and his bride a wedding present: an expensive leather Bible with their names printed in gold lettering. Arlo left it in the box and never opened it. But for months afterwards his grandfather kept asking if he liked the Bible. Arlo told Norris, “The wife had written a nice thank-you note, and we'd thanked him in person, but somehow he couldn't let it lie, he always had to ask about it.”
Finally, Arlo grew curious enough to open the Bible. “The joke was on me,” Arlo said. “I finally took that Bible out of the closet and I found that granddad had placed a twenty-dollar bill at the beginning of the Book of Genesis, and at the beginning of every book … over thirteen hundred dollars in all. And he knew I'd never find it.” [Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith (Riverhead Books, 1998), p. 95]
God has treasure for you in the pages of your Bible. It is the truth we find in its pages that is more precious than twenty-dollar-bills. Jesus once prayed for us, "Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth" (John 17:17). To sanctify is to make holy or righteous. You can help answer Jesus' prayer by opening your Bible today and letting the Holy Spirit begin to transform you into the image of God.
Prayer: Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you it is a living transforming book that can change us and our lives. You give us the power to change we find no where else. We are your handiwork. Transform us, we pray, in the name of Jesus, amen.
The elephant and the light...
Today's thought:
Hebrews 1:1-2, "In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe."
Do you remember the famous story about the six blind men and the elephant? One blind man touches the belly of the animal and thinks it's a wall. Another grabs the elephant's ear and thinks he's touching a fan. A third blind man touches the tail and thinks he's holding a rope. On they go, each grabbing a part of the elephant without any one of them knowing what it is they really feel.
What's the point of the story? We are all blind men when it comes to God. We know part of him, but we don't know really know who he is, we are all just grasping in the dark, thinking we know more than we do.
But there are two major problems with this analogy. First, the whole story is told from the vantage point of someone who clearly knows that the elephant is an elephant. For the story to make its point, the narrator has to have clear and accurate knowledge of the elephant. The second flaw with this story is even more serious. The story is a perfectly good description of human inability to know God by our own devices. But the story never considers this paradigm-shattering question: What if the elephant talks? What if he tells the blind men: "That wall-like structure is my side. That fan is really my ear. And that's not a rope; it's a tail." If the elephant were to say all this, would the six blind me be considered humble for ignoring his word?
God has spoken. To ignore or neglect His words is like a man dying of thirst in the desert, coming upon and oasis with a clear running stream, and passing on. When I read one of my favorite books like "Mere Christianity," by CS Lewis, something almost mystical is happening. The thoughts of a man now long gone are living in my mind. I am thinking his thoughts after him. When I pick up my Bible and begin to read I am thinking the very thoughts of the infinite Mind after Him. This is the power of the written word. It has the power to transform our thoughts and influence our minds for good or evil. When those thoughts are God's thoughts they have the power to save (Romans 10:17), to sanctify or make holy (John 17:17), to transform (Hebrews 4:12), and to bless our lives as James tells us in James 1:22-25, "Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do."
Can such a little thing as reading a book really make a difference in my life? Yes! A life transforming difference. If your new to Bible reading start with the book of John in the New Testament. Then read it asking God to reveal Himself through those words. He will! Read it. Do it. Be blessed in all you do. "Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path" (Psalm 119:105). May the path before you be revealed by the light of His word.
Prayer: Father, You could have been distant but You came near. Your Word came to heal us, forgive us, save us, and change us. We thank You and praise You for the Word, Your Son Jesus, and Your word, the Bible. What a privilege to think Your thoughts after You. May we not just hear but also do. In Jesus name, amen.