Groundbreaking

About two weeks ago, our pastor exhorted everyone in the congregation to read the Bible.

This is not terribly groundbreaking, but like most people in our church, I knew I should be reading the Bible but didn't do it nearly often enough. One way or another, I had become jaded. Growing up in church, I had become familiar with the stories. Going back to at least high school, and through college, I had read through the Bible several times independently or with groups. After a while it began to seem repetitive, and even with the best intentions I could not keep up with any serious commitment to maintain a daily devotion. I have a good memory, and in my own wisdom I reasoned that if the Bible never changed, then surely I'd heard it all before.

Taking our pastor to be a man of greater wisdom than myself, I began going through the reading plan he outlined. (It's probably the best reading plan I've ever used. See the "Life Journal" link to the right for more details.) This morning, while reading through a passage of 2 Chronicles, God opened my eyes to a wonderful kernel of truth:

God's word is unchanging, but we are not.

We have to keep reading the Bible and studying it because we change throughout life. The last time I read most of these passages I was probably in high school or college. Now I am married and looking forward to the birth of our first child. My frame of reference is completely different. The things that I gleaned from the Bible as a teenage boy are not the same as what I see as a father-to-be, and I'm certain that as my children grow and I reach retirement, the things that are important to me will be radically different yet again. Even if my core beliefs are the same, I am not. The world keeps changing and I keep changing, so every time I open the Bible, its going to impact me in a different way- not because it is different, but because I am different than last time. It must be an anchor, reminding me that Jesus is our firm foundation, unchanging and unshakable, and able to reshape and refine me through all of life's changes.