What's So Amazing About Scripture?Uzorak

A Stream Of Water

Are you ready to kick start or reboot your passion for and amazement at God's Word? 

For the next 7 days we will discover what the Bible says about itself and its power to change our life and world. An exciting way to do that is to explore some of the  pictures the Bible compares itself to. Let's start right away with this one…

Scripture describes itself as a river. 

As we delight in and ponder its words and verses, we are “like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither.” (Psalm 1:3)

Picture a tree planted by a flowing stream. Now imagine one planted in the desert. Which is more healthy, sturdy and fruitful? This is the spiritual difference between someone who draws wisdom from God’s Word every day and the one who forfeits this opportunity. 

Not just spiritual growth, there’s also joy and vitality to be found in sending down our roots into this river. For example, John of Damascus, back in AD 740 commented on this verse and urged us to “draw from the fountain of purest waters in the everlasting garden” where we can “soak in the Scriptures which possess endless grace.” 

We should not only ponder each verse, chapter and story, but also its entire Story from beginning to end, as it flows like a river from source to sea, from creation to new creation. The Bible is the best Story ever told. It includes a vast cast of people, the most important being Jesus, and thousands of surprising twists and turns. It progresses like a great tributary-fed river, growing larger and larger as it goes, winding this way and that, yet all the while heading in one direction toward an epic, plot-resolving climax. 

Changing the picture from tree to boat, as we live in the story of Scripture, we are not just bystanders but participants, each of our small stories getting swept into that larger Story. Like no other book before or after, Scripture has a unique ability to draw us into its magnificent flow, the grandest of stories, giving our lives direction and energy. Let’s leave the shore and let it take us where it’s going.