Not Just One Way

There is not just one way to read the Bible every day.  But beware.

It will change your mind.

It will change your heart.

It will change how you see.

It will change what you see.

     And how you respond.

It will change what you do

           and how you do it

           with excellence before the King

     whether cleaning toilets or wiping noses

                  or making multi-million dollar corporate decisions.

It will strengthen.

It will fill you with salt and light

        with grace in irritating situations

        with joy even in dark places

        with a radically different way to live.

I read passages in the Bible every day.

          Sometimes before the dawn.

          At times with morning coffee.

          A pocket of time – sometime in the day --

                a priority slipped in

                           between a rock and a hard place,

     or as an old refined Southern woman once told me,

             “Make it first.  Before you read anything else.”

   I still remember her quaking words spoken now 28 years ago,

                  even now when I sort through my email

                  or sit to read a manuscript.

                           “Have you read your Bible yet?”

And when I spend precious days and nights with the grandkids

           who run several marathons

                      every day,

        I read before I get in bed or as I sip some nightly tea

                                                     in the sudden silence of babies sleeping.

              Like setting out my clothes for the next day,

                God prepares the strength and grace I will need,

                                              ready and locked in place,

                    and brings sweetly to a close in the late evening

                                       what may have been hectic, precious and wild.

It is not a rule or a routine or a ritual

              but because God changes me through His Word.

It is my strength and shield,

            my hiding place and my refuge,

   the place where God reorients my day

              and changes my life.

It is not just another book about spiritual things,

         but the very Words of God.

 

Your Word is a lamp to my feet

       and a light to my path.

                        Psalm 119.105