« THE BUZZ AT ZION | Main | THE BUZZ AT ZION »
April 11, 2007
FROM THE COUCH
Removing The Veil – Part 1
Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Your Law
Psalm 119:18
Do you ever feel like you have a veil over your eyes when you are trying to read the Bible? Maybe you read a chapter or two, and almost immediately you can’t remember what you’ve just read. Or maybe you find it hard to bridge the considerable gap in time and culture between your world and the world of the writers of Scripture. Maybe reading any book is difficult for you in this fast-paced, high tech, image-oriented world. For a number of reasons, many if not most Christians really struggle when it comes to reading the Bible. So how do we remove the veil? How do we make the Bible come alive for us? Over the next few weeks, I’ll offer a few suggestions. I hope that they are useful.
This week, let’s focus on approaching the Scriptures with the right perspective. This is very important, because if we don’t read the Scriptures with the proper perspective, we are sure to walk away from our reading largely unaffected. So what is the wrong perspective? I think it involves approaching the Bible on my terms. This means focusing completely on me - what I want to get out of reading it, when I want to fit it into my schedule, how much I feel like concentrating as I read it, etc. It is a completely self-centered perspective. In reality, God gave us the Bible on His terms. When my central focus in reading the Bible is on God and not myself, it’s amazing what happens. I don’t have to make the Bible come alive, I find that it already is alive (Hebrew 4:12). When I can properly see God as the central focus of everything, then I can use the truth of the Scriptures to successfully navigate through life. However, if I approach the Bible with the idea that I can modify God to make Him closer to being made in my image, then none of it makes sense. But it’s not because there’s something wrong with the Bible. It’s because I have approached it with the wrong perspective.
Let me give you an example of one who approached the Scriptures with the right perspective. David wrote “I love your commands more than gold, more than pure gold” (Psalm 119:27). In fact, David expresses His love for God’s Law no less than 10 times in this Psalm. David can express such great love for God’s commands because He sees them with the proper perspective. He sees God’s Character in them. He sees God’s Holiness, and goodness, and righteousness, and justice. He sees God! My prayer this week is that God would remove the veil from our eyes so that we can each experience the treasure of beholding the wondrous things that He has revealed in His Word.
Pastor Couch
Posted by Jennifer Herrmann at April 11, 2007 01:25 PM