"Read Your Bible"

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January 21, 2007 Epiphany 3C

Sermon Title: “Read Your Bible”

Series: How to Have a Happy New Year

Text: Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10, Psalm 19, Luke 4:14-21

Dr. Steve Jackson

NewSong Community Church

Delivered on January 21, 2007

“The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul…the ordinances of the Lord are true and righteous altogether, more to be desired than gold, even much fine gold….”

Psalm 19:7-10

Read Your Bible

I’m reading a book[i] right now that begins with a parable about a little boy who was going on an outing to a museum with his grandmother with a stop planned on the way to enjoy a sack lunch in a park. The little boy went to a Christian school and he was in the middle of a class to prepare him to join the church. Obviously the little boy had heard someone say he needed to read his Bible and so after he had finished his sandwich the little boy shifted away from his grandmother, faced out into the park, took from his book bag a little New Testament he had been given in his class and he proceeded to read, moving his eyes back and forth across the page in a devout (and uncharacteristic) silence. After a long minute, he closed his little Bible, returned it to his book bag and said, “Okay grandma, I’m ready, let’s go to the museum.”

His grandmother was impressed, but she was also amused because the little boy could not yet read. He wants to read. His sister can read. Some of his friends can read. But this little boy can’t read and he knows he can’t read. He sometimes even announces to his family, “I can’t read” as if to remind them of what he is missing.

So what was the little boy doing “reading” his Bible on the park bench that afternoon? What was that all about? Well, for the author of the book I’m reading, and to me, the story of little Hans (that’s his name) forms a perfect parable of what many of us feel like in the church when it comes to our Bibles. Most of us own a Bible. We want to read the Bible. We know we should read the Bible. And some of us even do read the Bible. But we discover that even when we do we’re much like little Hans sitting on his park bench, our eyes moving back and forth across the pages, “reading” but not reading, reverent and devout as you can be, but uncomprehending. Honoring the Bible, but confused or unaware about what it has to offer. This morning I’m going to talk about reading your Bible.

We’re actually in the third of a four week series about how to have a great 2007. I’ve already suggested that you should try to RECOGNIZE GOD in all the ways he is at work around you, especially in more mundane aspects of your life. Last week, as a second thing to do, I suggested we should REALIZE OUR GIFTEDNESS and begin living out all the ways God has gifted us to serve the body of Christ and those around us. Today, the third thing to do in order to have a great 2007 is to READ YOUR BIBLE.

Before I give you some important reasons why you should read your Bible let me say this. I know many of you do read your Bibles. I recognize that reading your Bible can be difficult. I also recognize that you probably already agree with me that you should read your Bible more. I’m sure you also realize the Bible is God’s word to us, the revelation of who he is and his plan for his world. I recognize that most Christians own and read their Bibles, so much of what I’m going to say supposes that you already do read your Bibles at least sometime.

What I’m trying to suggest you do when I say “Read your Bible” in 2007 is that you try to read it formatively – that you chew on it and eat it and make it a part of who you are – in other words that you live out what you’re reading.

There’s a biblical precedent for this “eating God’s word” you know. More than once in the Old Testament God instructs a prophet to eat a scroll with God’s words on them. For instance Jeremiah 15:16 says, “When your words came, I ate them; they were my joy and my heart's delight, for I bear your name, O LORD God Almighty.”

So next week when you pull out your Bible and you begin reading in response to this sermon I want you to keep in mind the image of little Hans, reverently, devoutly, religiously, reading his Bible, and it not meaning a thing except for his good intentions. But more importantly I want you to picture the sandwich that little Hans took to the park that day. I don’t know what kind of sandwich it was, but I want you to picture Hans eating that sandwich and I want you to pray, “God, may your words that I’m about to read enter me and become a part of my being, just like that sandwich.”

All that said, let me give you some reasons to read your Bible in 2007. If you’ll listen to these reasons, and be convinced to do it, you’ll have a great year, I’m confident of that. Let me give you three important reasons to read you Bible that are found in our texts for today.

I. BECAUSE YOU CAN

The first reason to read your Bible is BECAUSE YOU CAN. We take the Bible and accessibility to it for granted today, but it’s not always been that way, and it still isn’t that way today in many parts of the world. Truth is, if we look back in time, or even if we just look around the planet today, we’ll discover that the freedom we have to open and read the Bible is actually a great privilege.

The text from Nehemiah tells the story of a time when people didn’t have access to God’s Word. The Israelites of Nehemiah’s day had been in Babylonian captivity for a long, dark time. When they finally were allowed to return to their beloved homeland much of their heritage and culture had been lost as had much of their religion. After they returned Nehemiah led them on a campaign to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. Now with their walls rebuilt and with a bit of security they had this opportunity to start over. But the faith of their fathers was nearly forgotten by this new generation of Israelites. Then one day they rediscovered the Book of the Law that had been lost and the Priest Ezra was instructed to stand up and read the word to the gathered people. They were allowed once more to hear the message directly from God’s word. Ezra opened the sacred scriptures, words that would help the people find their way back to their faith, and in that moment, a period of terrible darkness was ended for the Israelites. They again learned the will of God for their lives. They knew again of God’s deep love for them. They knew again of God’s decrees and judgments. The void was gone. Direction and purpose were renewed. Israel was reborn that day. Why? All because they again had access to God’s word and because they listened as Ezra read. Look what it says about the people. The text says Ezra read from early morning until midday and the people were attentive…they stood up…and then it says they “bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord with their faces to the ground” and they had to be instructed not to mourn or grieve because they “wept when the heard the words” (v. 9) I would assume their tears were tears of joy at hearing such wonderful truth and tears of remorse for the ways they realized they must have been grieving God now that they knew his expectations. But they are told not to be grieved because “the joy of the Lord is your strength!” The response to the rediscovery of God’s word and its reading is overwhelming and it points out how you and I should read God’s word attentively, we should soak it up, first and foremost simply because we can.

There are others even today who cannot read God’s word. Some people live in lands where the Bible is banned and just possessing the Book is grounds for execution. Others don’t have the Bible translated in their language. Still others simply cannot read.

I read an incredible story recently about a man from Kansas City who was severely injured in an explosion.[ii] The man’s face was badly disfigured, and he lost his eyesight as well as both his hands in the explosion. He was a new Christian, and one of his greatest disappointments after his accident was that he could no longer read the Bible. Then he heard about a lady in England who read Braille with her lips. Hoping to do the same, he sent for some books of the Bible in Braille. Much to his dismay, however, he discovered that the nerve endings in his lips had been destroyed by the explosion. But then one day as he brought one of the Braille pages to his lips his tongue happened to touch a few of the raised characters and he realized he could feel them with his tongue! There was hope! Perhaps he could learn to read Braille with his tongue! In time he trained himself, and as of the time of the writing of the article I read about him in, the man had "read" through the entire Bible four times.

Imagine wanting to read the Bible so badly you’d do it with your tongue! And what about you and me? Many of us have multiple copies of the Bible stashed around our homes and we seldom take the time to read. Or else if we do we read like little Hans…with nothing really sinking in. The first reason to read your Bible here as we begin 2007 is simply because you can.

II. BECAUSE OF THE BENEFITS

A second reason to read your Bible this year can be found in the Psalm of the day, Psalm 19, and that’s BECAUSE OF THE BENEFITS. As you may have noticed as we read, there are many benefits that accompany what the Psalmist alternately refers to as God’s “law,” “precepts,” “commandments,” and “ordinances.” All these mean the same thing – he’s talking about God’s word to humanity found in the Bible.

a. It’s Perfect

There are far too many benefits to mention them all, but let me mention just a few, starting in verse 7 which reads, “The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul.” The word perfect here means “complete.” In other words, there is nothing lacking. Everything we need for salvation, everything we need to know about how to live in this world and how to get to the next world are contained in the Holy Scriptures.

I like the way Eugene Peterson puts this verse in his paraphrase of the Bible called The Message, he writes, “The revelation of God is whole and pulls our lives together.” Nothing is missing, and because nothing is missing, look at what that does to the person; it revives the soul; it pulls our fragmented lives together and makes us whole.

b. It’s Sure and True

The second half of that verse tells us, “the decrees of the Lord are sure, making wise the simple and over in verse 9 we read that “the ordinances of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.” One of the things we need most in today’s world is something that we can count on – something we can bank on, that we can be confident is sure and true (v. 9b), not 50% of the time, or 75%, or 99% of the time, but sure and true all the time.

It amazes me how some advertisers and politicians can spin facts and statistics and quote polls and surveys to show that their product, or candidate, or whatever, is the best one around. I ask you, who sells the most full-sized pick-ups in America? What’s the leading brand of aspirin? Is it the one that sells the most? Or the one that doctor’s recommend most? Or the one pediatricians recommend? Or the one podiatrists in Peoria recommend? People will say all kinds of things, all of them seemingly true, but all are distortions, all of them are conjured up to make you buy more of their product or to vote for their candidate. And the common denominator among them all is they all think you and I are not very intelligent. But here’s what Psalm 19 says, it says the decrees of the Lord are sure, and they “make wise the simple.” There’s no spin doctoring going in with the Word of God. The simplest among us can get its message and it’s always sure and true.

c. It’s Clear and Gives Guidance

Still another benefit listed by Psalm 19 is that God’s word is clear and it gives us guidance for life. Look at the second half of verse 8, “the commandment of the Lord is clear, enlightening the eyes.” These couple of verses, verses 8 and 9, in The Message, read like this:

The signposts of God are clear
      and point out the right road.
   The life-maps of God are right,
      showing the way to joy.
   The directions of God are plain
      and easy on the eyes.

In other words, God doesn’t try to trip us up in what he teaches us in his word, he’s trying to get us on the right road – it’s like a map that shows the way to true joy in life.

Have you ever been really and truly lost? I know I have. I’m usually pretty good with directions, but sometimes, especially when I get out of my own element, I can get so turned around. It happens to me when I’m in the woods hunting. I have this cousin whom I hunt with and he and I sometimes walk through the woods and we turn here and there, and we backtrack, and before long we’ve walked three or four miles into the woods and I’ll be honest with you, I’m about as turned around as a person can be. But I never worry as long as I’m with my cousin because I know he knows those woods like the back of his hand and he can always get us back out of there. I always feel the same way when I’m over in Africa traveling with Pastor Yaw. We get out on some of the dirt paths they call roads and we turn here and there and cross rivers and creeks and it gets dark and I’m totally lost, but I never worry as long as Pastor Yaw is there because he knows where he’s going and I know I’ll get to my destination.

The Bible is a guide like that for our life. It’s better than the best GPS system around. Life has a way of causing you to get lost from time to time, of not knowing what the next step holds, or which direction to turn. But over the years I’ve discovered that there is guidance for almost any situation you can imagine to be found in the Bible. And it’s not complex…it’s clear and you can read the signposts. But you’ve got to get in there and read and be formed by what you read in order to do that. You can’t read like Hans…

d. It Warns us of Danger and Leads us to our Reward

Let me mention one more benefit of reading God’s word. It’s found in verse 11 where the Psalmist says, “Moreover, by them [God’s words] is your servant warned; in keeping them is great reward.” This is perhaps the greatest benefit of all. God’s word keeps us from danger (sin) and leads us to God’s great reward. The Message here reads, “God's Word warns us of danger and directs us to hidden treasure.”

The warning and reward benefits to God’s word for some reason remind me of the Indiana Jones movies. Indy is always searching for archaeological treasures and much of the time he has some ancient text or scroll or map, or at least part of a scroll or map to warn him and guide him. I recall scenes where he reads where to step and where not to step, or when to duck and when to jump. As the movies unfold we see him understanding more and more of the maps or writings he has as the clues unfold. I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed it or not, but usually in those movies Jones eventually gets the treasure at the end only to have it snatched away by some villain or to have it be lost to the good guys and the bad because someone gets greedy. That’s where Hollywood and the Bible part ways (at least one of the places where they part J) For you see, with God’s word, it is our sure and faithful guide, which points out the dangers we should avoid and which eventually always directs us to hidden treasure which is ours in Christ Jesus.

The Psalmist and the songwriter remind us of this in that great song we sang today called “Thy Word.” It’s based on a couple of verses from Psalm 119 that say, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path (v. 105) and in verse 11 of that Psalm we read, “Your word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against You.” In keeping God’s word we avoid the lure and danger of sin, and we have a guide, a light for our path which leads us to his great reward, and I praise God for that.

III. BECAUSE JESUS DID.

The third and final reason to read your Bible I want to mention this morning comes from the gospel reading, and that’s that we should read our Bibles BECAUSE JESUS DID.

The text from Luke is a familiar one. Jesus returns to his home town of Nazareth and stands up in the synagogue there to preach and reads from the Book of Isaiah. Then after he reads from the Bible he sits down and says, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” The point of this passage in the context of this message is that Jesus not only read the Bible, he found his very own purpose within its pages and he used those pages to share that purpose with the world. The promise to us is that if we search the texts, if we read them and mediate upon them and memorize them we’ll discover our purpose there as well. Perhaps even more important than finding our purpose there, we’ll also find Jesus himself.

Two little sisters were doing their best to put together a cardboard puzzle map of the United States. But the map was cut up into odd shapes and the little girls didn’t know one state from another or where each belonged. They were getting discouraged when suddenly the older sister turned a piece of the puzzle over and saw on it part of a man's nose. On the back of another piece she saw part of a man's ear. "There's a man in it!" she exclaimed. Both girls knew what a man's face looked like and soon put the pieces together correctly. Then their father came in and carefully turned the whole puzzle over for them, and there was a perfect map of the United States. The Bible is a puzzle to many because they do not realize that "there's a Man in it." In fact the whole book, from beginning to end is about a Man, the Lord Jesus Christ.

There’s a wonderful thing going on in this passage from Luke – did you notice? Jesus stands to read the Scripture and as he did Luke tells us “The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.” That’s what happens when we read Scripture. Our eyes become fixed on Jesus. Why? Because from beginning to end, from Genesis to Revelation, its pages are all about Jesus! He even said so himself. Remember the story of Jesus and the men on the Emmaus Road? There in Luke 24:27 it says, “And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.”

We should read the Bible because Jesus did, and because Jesus did - and many who came after him - when we do read the word of God (with a little “w”) we discover the Word or God (capital “w”) waiting there to meet us. He is revealed to us. Ask the Holy Spirit to take the things of Christ and show them to you and He will.

There are many other reasons we should read the word of God daily. I don’t have time to mention them all. Many reasons aren’t even mentioned in this text, the greatest of which is probably that we are commanded to read God’s word. Joshua 1:8, which is a great memory verse by the way, says this, “Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” That’s a pretty good reason.

Another is because God’s word is like the bread of life. You remember Jesus’ words back to Satan as he was being tempted in the desert don’t you? When tempted to turn stones into loaves of bread Jesus relied on Scripture and responded saying, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every Word that comes from the mouth of God" (Matt. 4:4). When we try to "live by bread alone," we feed the body but starve the soul. I read an article in USA Today a while back about a man who died of starvation in Olympia, Washington. After his death it was discovered that he had $38,000 on deposit in local banks. He never referred to his money, even when his doctors were treating him for malnutrition. He let his body starve with plenty on hand to feed him. Don’t make the same mistake, don’t let your soul starve when the word of God is right there at hand to provide you with life-giving spiritual food. I’ve given you some important reasons to read your Bible every day in 2007: Because you can, because of the benefits, and because Jesus did. How about you? Will you feed upon the word of God this year? Will you eat it up like Hans ate his sandwich in the park that day? I pray you will.

To summarize what we’ve said so far in this series, For a Great 2007

Let’s Recognize God in our midst,

and …
Realize our Giftedness living out our God-given purpose

and…
     Read our Bibles, why?
        because we can,
          because of the benefits, and
            because Jesus did.…Amen?
Amen.