The Satisfaction of Being Full

The Bible? Oh, please! Can’t you just let me hear God speak?! Can’t I just experience His love? I want to know God, not read a textbook about Him!

If you feel that way, I sympathise. That’s the way I felt about it for a long time. In fact, I reckon most of us go for experience over research.

When I first became a Christian, all I wanted to do was experience more of His presence, not spend hours each day reading through a dry old book. It reminded me too much of painful hours I spent as a kid, practising piano scales and wishing I was outside! But my pastor was a persuasive guy, so eventually I began opening up my Bible every morning. 

And you know something? It changed me!

God’s Word started to guide my responses and my behaviour and shape my world for the better. Now, when someone’s really bugging me, all of a sudden a small voice whispers “turn the other cheek” (Matthew 5:39); or “wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy” (James 3:17).

It sounds really mundane, reading the Bible every day, and in some respects it is. But I can’t tell you how glad I am that I stuck with it.

Playing the piano, making music, is a great treasure in my life today – because I kept at it, kept practising, even when it was mundane and boring and I wanted, longed, to be doing something else. And it’s the same – only much, much better – with my Bible.

It is like music for my soul.

If there is one thing, just one thing that I can point to that was the smartest thing I ever did after I gave my life to Jesus, it was opening up that Bible as a daily habit, and letting God speak His Word into my heart through His Spirit.

If you hunger to hear God speak into your life, can I offer you just this one thing? Go grab the Bible that’s gathering dust up on the shelf somewhere and read it… every day.

My prayer is that God’s Word will be music to your soul. My prayer is that you will hear God speak. I have absolutely no doubt that you won’t have to wait long!

LIFE APPLICATION QUESTIONS 

• When it comes to knowing more of God, are you a “just give me the experience” type of person, or do you make a habit of sitting down to study His Word?
• What do you think are the advantages of your chosen method? Can you think of any disadvantages or things you might be missing out on?
• The person who prompted me, and kept prompting me, to read my Bible regularly was my pastor, Phil. Who do you have in your life, maybe a close friend, family member or someone from church, who can challenge you in the same way? 
• Why not give that person a call today, and ask them if they’d be willing to check in with you regularly about how much time you’re spending in God’s Word, listening for His voice?