Thinking Out Loud: Why Did Reading My Bible Become Optional?

Hey Friend!

Can I be honest about something? I have been really convicted recently.

It all started last week when I was pondering the question, "What does it mean to be a Christian?" And the pivotal part of that whole line of thought was that to be a Christian means that you have declared and given Jesus complete lordship over your life.

And then yesterday at church, it was like the very same questions I had been pondering were right in line with the message. It felt like both a punch in the heart but also a spark of inspiration.

This spark of wanting to know my God and delight in Him.

But then that got me thinking.

If Jesus is Lord in my life, and I want to follow Him and know Him and delight in Him, why did reading His Word become optional?

Isn't that one of the simplest ways to know Him?

Last week when I was pondering what it means to be a Christian, I think I was finally able to let go of my guilt that I wasn't faithfully following Jesus because I don't look like the Christian I used to be. And I realized that giving him lordship over my life means faithfully following him in the life He has actually given me, not the "ideal life" I'd envisioned. 

This sermon this week didn't leave me feeling the guilt of "I'm doing enough in my Christian faith". It left me longing to be near the One my soul delights in.

I think somewhere along my faith, I stopped marveling at the privilege of being in relationship with God and reading His Word. There was a time when I was super passionate for the Word of God and I had the time to spend hours reading it. But then life changed, I had other good, God given things show up in my life like getting married to my husband and adopting my son. God placed me on a new path where I get the privilege and honor of having them take up some of my attention. And I love them to pieces!

I still read my Bible and participated in Bible studies. 

But maybe along the way I stopped marveling at the privilege and wonder of being able to spend time with my God.

When I first moved to my new home, it seemed like every night for that first month living here, after everyone else was asleep, and the lights were all turned off, my brain became alert and hyper-focused on every noise and creek this house made! The sounds would freak me out and I literally had to ask ChatGPT what was going on and if someone was breaking into my house! I was pretty spooked for that entire first month. 

But then do you know what happened? My brain adapted. It no longer was alert to all the noises of my house. I became immune to the sounds. It's actually a phenomenon in psychology called habituation, where we have a tendency to respond less strongly to something we've experienced repeatedly. Which is why the sounds my house makes no longer freaks me out at night.

I also think there is a bit of a spiritual habituation going on inside of me as well. 

I stopped marveling that God, the Creator of the universe. The One who spoke galaxies into existence. The One who knows every hair on my head. 

Not because I stopped caring about my faith. But because something so extraordinary as walking in relationship with God, had become ordinary. 

But because something so extraordinary as walking in relationship with God, had become ordinary. 

God, has spoken. 

And it is recorded in this book we call the Bible. 

And I own multiple copies of his Word. 

An embarrassing amount of copies!

One on my nightstand. And another few on my bookshelf. I have multiple versions and translations. I even have one in Greek! The Bible app is on my phone. I can open it literally whenever I want. 

That the God of the universe has spoken at all, and I have His words written down in a book right next to me, that should be astonishing to me! And yet, it's become ordinary. Not because the Bible is ordinary. But because I stopped seeing the extraordinary in what has become familiar. That thought honestly humbles me.

And this isn't just true with the Bible. I think this is also true with my relationship with God. I think back to when I first started dating my husband. We talked on the phone for hours a day, and then we couldn't wait to see each other. I was giddy with excitement. It was gross! Just kidding! But young love is something else. 

Now we have been married 7 years. I have grown accustomed to hearing his voice. It is normal for relationships to naturally drift towards familiarity. But the question is, how do we keep familiarity from becoming indifference? This is the same with my relationship with God.

When did hearing God's voice become something that I stopped marveling at the privilege and wonder of hearing?!

When did hearing God's voice become something that I stopped marveling at the privilege and wonder of hearing?!

I used to think that infertility stole my wonder, but now I'm not so sure. I used to look at it as the villain of my story, but what if it is actually a catalyst? Infertility awakened questions that I had never truly had to ask until confronted with the possibility that God might not do what I desperately wanted Him to do.

Who is the God I've believed in all these years?

Is He good even if He doesn't heal me?

What kind of character does He have to allow me to suffer?

Who is God?

If you've grown up in the church, you've probably heard of the Blazing Furnace in Daniel 3, where Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to serve the Babylonian king's gods or worship the image of gold he set up. They get thrown in the blazing furnace and then God saves them.

The part of this story I didn't really hear talked about is what they say to the king. 

"If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it and he will deliver us from Your Majesty's hand. But even if He does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." 

- Daniel 3:17-18

But even if He does not...

Even if He does not save us, we will follow Him.

Who is this God that they had full confidence that He would save them, and even if he didn't, they still had full confidence in Him? It wasn't just His power to save them that they had confidence in, it was in who He is. 

Who is this God?

Even if He does not heal me, I want to follow Him.

Even if He does not heal me, I want to know God.

For so long I thought God was absent,

But what if He has been quietly drawing me back to Him all along? 

What if He has been restoring my wonder?

Infertility was a catalyst of my story. It exposed where I already lost some of my wonder and forced my faith out of the familiar and into something deeper. 

Somewhere along the way I stopped marveling that the God of the universe has spoken and I have His words. I started seeing the Bible as a book that I'm supposed to read instead of seeing it as a way to know the One my soul delights in.

Jesus is Lord of my life, and I want to know Him. 

So maybe it's time to open my Bible again. 

As always, thanks for reading!