Lent XXXVII

The Scripture is a writing that is God inspired.  It is one of a kind.  Some folks may want to talk about it as just another book, but it is so much more.  Oh, it is history, and family life stories, poetry, prayers, and a powerful church growth resource, but is still always more than just the sum of all these things.  It is a Word which has been passed through the ages.  It is a Word which lives.  As surely as you and I are those in whom creative breath has been breathed, so has this Holy Word been brought into being through the divine breathing into it of the Holy Spirit.

 

While it never changes, it is always revealing something new within its verses and chapters to those who read it with a pondering and wondering spirit.  We can read the most familiar parts of it again and again and all of sudden find ourselves hearing a Word from God so clear that we cannot help but wonder why we never heard it before.  Yet, these epiphany like moments happen again and again and with such clarity that we know what we are experiencing is more than just divine revelation, but a witness to the living power of the Word as well. 

 

I have been reading this living Word for a lifetime.  Almost as long as I can remember reading can I remember having a Bible to read.  And more importantly, I can remember a lifetime of reading it.  Long before I had any sense of its power, I was reading it.  Long before I knew the value it would have in my life, it was soaking into my soul little by little.  I still have that first Bible.  I remember spending time with it as a child.  I am grateful for it and the many which have been held in my hands and nurtured me along the way in my spiritual journey.  There is no book like it.  And I am sure that if I live to read another thousand times, there will still be a new Word from God waiting for me when I have finished.