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Listen while you read: "When We All Get To Heaven"1
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2 Timothy 3:16-17 – 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 complete, equipped for every good work. (ESV)
To keep from becoming mentally atrophied, I use a free language learning program. The app reports that I've been successful in completing the lessons for 730 days in a row. Maintaining a really long streak actually becomes high motivation to login every day. So, I am really focused daily to succeed, yet I am not truly the successful doer of 730 consecutive days of lessons.
One of the program's concessions is to make an allowance for missing a day by using what it calls a streak-freeze — a kind of cheat. When a day's input is missed, to avoid the streak being set to zero, you automatically use a streak-freeze, if you have saved them up. Initially, they are limited to only three in about three months: not many. I have needed several streak-freeze days to keep the streak going over the previous two years.
Why is my desire to keep a streak going greater than my desire to read my Bible every day? Have I been sucked into the challenge of learning a language on consecutive days because of my desire not to atrophy, over and above my priority to read the Bible? As it is, I spend enough time in front of the computer. Is it too much for me to sit still any longer and read? Surely the Bible should come first and not be supplanted by a mere program.
For sixty years, through school, multiple decades of church, Bible college, and finally, university religious studies training and teaching, I like to think I am familiar with the Word of God. So I do know my Bible by repetition of exposure, unlike the language I am daily absorbing, because I have not yet acquired the conceit of familiarity. Sadly, my mind, if not yours, wanders away from God in the absence of a daily read of His Word.
Woe is me, as this foolishness may deny me an encounter with what Jesus is saying in particular today! Prayer is good to ask questions and seek help and advice, but unless we become still before God, waiting, wanting to hear His voice, how can we come face-to-face with our God found in Scripture?
Does it matter if we miss a day? Can we get a streak-freeze to get by until tomorrow without reading? Yes, but there are no cheats to hearing from God, only lessons to learn and prayers for grace for the interim as He waits for our return. The Bible is often God's unpretentious way of guiding our thoughts, speaking truth for today!
Prayer: Lord, I am embarrassed to be here, before the throne of grace again, knowing that I have not sought You or Your will for me, with all my being. Fan into flame those embers of longing for reading and hearing Your Word to feed my soul for today, for I need You. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen.
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About the author:
Rod Marshall <roderickhenrymarshall@gmail.com>
Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
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