In a not-so-recent movie — one that probably few high school students have seen — Keanu Reeves plays a World War II soldier who marries a woman shortly before going off to fight in the war. She turns out not to be a good woman; she is unfaithful to him, and leaves him shortly after he returns from military service. Reeves' character, however, is intensely faithful to his wife throughout his years as a soldier. One way he demonstrates this faithfulness is by sending her a letter every day that he is gone — hundreds of letters over a couple of years, each one communicating his love for her and his desire to be with her. When the war finally is over, this soldier comes home, and enters his apartment. One of his first questions to his wife is: "Did you get my letters?" His question is answered by a nod to the corner of the room, where all of his letters are stacked together – unopened and unread! As his jaw drops and heart sinks, his wife carelessly explains: "Well, I didn’t need to read all of them; I just took them as signs that you were still alive and doing well." You can imagine what a crushing blow that would be to a lover. Think of the pain you would feel if someone you loved intensely left your carefully written letters unread and unopened, pushing them into a corner of their house.
The call to Christians to be disciplined in reading, studying, and knowing God's Word is the call to value the WORDS of the God who made us, loves us, and has given us in his written Word everything we need to know about Him — and how to be in a right relationship with Him through Jesus Christ, His Son. So many of us, though, leave God's Word — his careful "correspondence" with us — unread and shoved into a dark corner of our lives for long periods of time. For those who love Jesus and long to obey God, a life of discipline in the Word — reading it, studying it, and knowing it — is essential. Kent Hughes points out that it is simply impossible to be "profoundly influenced" by something that we do not know. To be influenced by God's Word and to live well as God's people, we need to discipline ourselves in the Word.
First, we need to discipline ourselves to read, study, and know the Word because God's Word is the primary way that he speaks to his people. Listen to the words of the Apostle Paul to Timothy:
"But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work" (2 Tim. 3:14-17).
Note that Paul says that the Scriptures are able to make Timothy "wise for salvation." The Bible is God's primary way of telling us how we are to be saved — and how we are to live wisely as God's saved people! Even more striking in Paul's discussion is the way he describes the Scriptures: "breathed out by God." This verse helps us form our belief in the "inspiration" of Scripture; it is literally breathed out by God in exactly the way he intends. We can say, with all confidence: "When the Bible speaks, God speaks." The Bible is the MAIN way God talks to us and tells us what we need to know about Him; we need to go there first…and often.
Jay Thomas gave a great illustration of this point a few weeks ago, and I'm going to tweak it a bit. Imagine that your friend at Wheaton North plays on the volleyball team there, and you decide that you'd really like to see her play volleyball. You know that there are volleyball courts all over Chicago, and you decide to set up a chair at North Avenue Beach, hoping to see your friend play volleyball on the sand courts by the lake. Now, might you see your friend play volleyball at North Avenue Beach on a random summer day? Maybe — there is a slight chance! But, what is your best bet to watch her play volleyball? It's showing up at Wheaton North, in the gymnasium, on a day when the Wheaton North volleyball team has a game! It's the same thing with God's Word. Instead of gazing up at the stars and asking God to speak to us, or lying in our beds begging God to give us instruction through a vision or dream, we should be going to the one place in which He has promised to speak to us: his written Word.
Second, we should read, study, and know God's Word because God has always called His people to be people of the Word. Have you read the book of Exodus recently? If you have, you know that Moses goes back to Pharaoh again and again with a common refrain: "The LORD says, 'Let my people go, that they may SERVE [or worship] me in the wilderness.'" Moses keeps bringing that message to Pharaoh — that God has a desire to get his people out of Egypt so that they can serve/worship him in the wilderness. Well, the people finally get out of Egypt — you know the story. And they all gather together at the foot of Mt. Sinai. They are finally ready to serve and worship God in the wilderness. Look at Exodus 20:1. What happens? Do they start singing praise songs? Do the people go do a big service project? No. "God SPOKE." In other words, the essence of service/worship for God's people is for them to LISTEN to their God as he SPEAKS WORDS to them – and then obey. There’s not anything wrong with praise songs or service projects; those things are great! But, we as God's people are first and foremost people of the WORD. Our service and worship are tied up in listening to God speak and living according to His Word. If that is true, then we need to devote ourselves tirelessly to knowing that Word.
Third, you should read, study, and know God's Word because what you fill yourself with will affect the way you live. Take a moment and consider all the things you put into your minds throughout the week. Television shows, songs, magazine articles, radio talk, video games…all of these things "fill" our minds. Now, while perhaps none of the items on that list is bad in and of itself, the sheer amount of pop culture that we take in can be staggering. Whether we like it or not, what we take in does begin to affect our mindset, beliefs, habits, and thought life. Even if we go to church on Sundays and Wednesdays, the "filling" that takes place during the other days can easily crowd out the "filling" of the Word. Listen again to Paul's words to Timothy:
"If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather, train yourself for godliness" (1 Tim. 4:6-7).
Notice the word that Paul chooses to describe the discipline of the Word in Timothy's life: "training." He wants Timothy not only to read and study the Word, but to be "trained" in it. It is an active description; it assumes that the Word is something that has power to actually affect the way someone lives. For those of us who truly want to follow Jesus as Savior and Lord, our "training" — our "filling" — must come first from the Bible. Rather than "training" ourselves FIRST with movies and media, we should be filling ourselves with God’s very Word; this will have an impact on the way we live, think, and obey our Savior.
Fourth and finally, you should read, study, and know God's Word because if you love someone, you will value their words. My wife Jeanne and I have a wonderful marriage, by God's grace. But, there are of course times when frustrations come! The one thing that perhaps makes Jeanne most frustrated is when I don't listen carefully to her words. Perhaps she'll tell me some important details about a dinner we have planned. When I ask her for those same details the next day, she understandably gets a bit frustrated with me. Why? Because I didn't listen carefully to her words, and by not listening to her words, I implicitly told her that I didn't value what she had to say! If we claim to love God, and yet don't value, study, and listen to his Word to us, we are like a husband who says "I love you dear" to his wife, yet tunes out everything she says.
This final point brings us back to the fundamental motivation for every spiritual discipline, which we discussed in our first week in this series: the GOSPEL. The ultimate motivation for reading, studying, and knowing God's Word must come from nothing less than a LOVE of God your Savior. A sense of duty, feelings of guilt, or an attempt to earn God's favor through your discipline — all of these motivations fall short of the relationship that God has already established with sinners like us through the sacrificial death of Jesus on the cross. Your motivation for growing in your Word discipline must be a deep LOVE for the God who has redeemed you by His grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. The gospel reality of salvation by grace should be what moves us toward Word discipline.
You've probably heard the saying: "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing well." I'd like to change that saying a bit as we apply it to reading God’s Word: "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing poorly!" Now, that's a bit of an overstatement, but here's what I mean. If you currently do NOT have any habit of spending intentional time reading God's Word, then ANY move toward discipline in this area will be an improvement. If you never read the Bible, but confess Christ as your Lord and Savior, start by reading the Bible once a week! Start slowly; build gradually. It could be perhaps more harmful to you if you make a commitment today to read the Bible every day, when you haven't been reading it at all; you may very well fail in the first week and become discouraged and overwhelmed with guilt. Make a commitment you can keep, and stick to it. You will grow over time in your ability to read and understand the Bible if you do it consistently.
Next, tell someone about your commitment to reading God's Word. I would love to hear about it, and so would your Small Group leaders! Find someone who can gently hold you accountable, and give them permission to ask you whether or not you've read the Word lately.
Finally, commit to read the Bible — every time you approach it — as if it is God's very Word to you…because it is! Say a brief prayer before you read, asking God to teach you by His Holy Spirit as you read His Word. Keep this mindset intentionally before you, even in the difficult passages of the Old Testament. The Bible is God's Word; when it speaks, He speaks. Read the Bible expecting God to speak to you.
