Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law (Psalm 119:18).
Imagine for a moment that you were taken hostage by terrorists. If one of them put a gun to your head and told you to curse Jesus, would you do it? Or would you stay faithful and die? I’d be willing to bet that nearly everyone reading this imagines they would stay faithful. But unless you’ve actually done it, the truth is you don’t really know how you would respond. None of us do.
That’s a pretty extreme situation, though, so let’s think about something easier. Suppose God spoke to you audibly, and told you to give up your career, your house, your car, sell everything you have, and use the money to go to Bible college, then spend the rest of your life as a missionary in New Guinea. Would you give up your present life and obey? I’m guessing that, once again, almost everybody reading this thinks they would say yes. I certainly think I would. But would I really do it? It hasn’t happened, so I can’t truthfully say I know.
So let’s try something even easier. If it would help you draw closer to God, would you be willing to spend fifteen minutes every morning reading the Scriptures, even if it means you have to go to bed earlier, and perhaps skip a favorite TV show?
It’s one thing to tell Jesus, “I’ll die for you,” when it’s only hypothetical. It’s an entirely different matter to say, “I’ll give up my time for you,” when I’d have to actually do it. But that observation immediately raises a further question: why do we consider spending time in God’s word a have-to rather than a get-to? Why aren’t we excited about studying the Scriptures?
I rise before dawn and cry for help; I have put my hope in your word. My eyes stay open through the watches of the night, that I may meditate on your promises (Psalm 119:147-148).
My goal is not to make you feel guilty, however, but to offer you something absolutely amazing. You see, I’ve discovered a secret: the more time I spend with God’s word, the more I fall in love with Jesus. The more I study the Scriptures, the better I can see Christ, and the better I see him, the more I trust him. As the Scripture says:
Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ (Romans 10:17).
Digging into the Bible is, obviously, not the only way to draw closer to God, but it’s a way that I know works. But the key to it working is not to read Scripture as an end in itself, but as a way to better know who God is, and who I am. The Bible is not important for itself, in other words, but for who it points to. Just look at what John says about his own gospel:
Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name (John 20:30-31).
The goal, then, is not just to know the Bible, but through the Bible, to know Christ.
So my earlier question becomes a serious challenge; will you take fifteen minutes every morning to read God’s word? Or, if reading is a problem, to listen to it? If you don’t know how to start, I wrote an article just for you. But beware; if you commit to doing this for six months, there’s a good chance you’ll decide that fifteen minutes a day is not enough, because the best way to get excited about God’s word is to dive in to it. I speak from experience on this. Try it and see for yourself.