Led by His SpiritSample

Just five days after being sworn in as President, Franklin D. Roosevelt paid a visit to retired Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. who was celebrating his ninety-second birthday. Holmes had been appointed to the court by Teddy Roosevelt and for nearly thirty years served as one of the most noted members of the body. Roosevelt found the elderly justice reading a copy of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives, with biographical sketches of numerous Greek and Roman leaders. When FDR asked why he was reading that (with the implication that at his advanced age, Holmes was wasting his time) Holmes replied, “To improve the mind.”

We never reach the point where we have learned all there is to know about God and His Word. No matter how many years we have been saved, how many church services we have attended, and how many times we have read the Bible, there is always more to discover. Even as an aged prisoner, knowing that he would soon be martyred for his faith, Paul asked Timothy to bring him copies of the Hebrew scriptures.

Paul was already very familiar with Scripture. He had studied the Old Testament extensively. And God had used him as one of the human penmen of much of the New Testament. Yet, even after all of the years Paul had spent in Scripture and even as he knew he would soon be in Heaven, Paul was still seeking and finding truths and insights from the Word of God. A healthy Christian at any age will be characterized by a desire to know more about God and His Word.