I realized a little while ago that it is Good Friday now...
When we think about how GOD orchestrates our lives, it is really amazing. I hear that, in project management, you have to go backwards from the planned event and figure out what needs to be done by when to reach the target date. Imagine having to plan the fulfillment of prophecy...to make everything fit... that Christ would die before the soldiers would break His bones, that He would be pierced in the side with a spear, that he would be given vinegar as a drink, and the soldiers would cast lots for his cloak, that he would bleed to death before sundown, that His followers would scatter... and so on.
People study the Bible for their whole lives and still don't understand everything it says... but we try to make the puzzle pieces fit. After you hear a lot of sermons, you see a lot of "literary license" in them...stretching what the words say into ideas of what it might mean... or making it fit our ideas so we can avoid any arguments, opposition, controversy, or other uncomfortable situations. If you only listen to sermons to learn about the Bible, your understanding will be limited.
I also can't imagine what it would be like to have to create zillions of sermons in a lifetime. In fact, whole sections of the Bible are forgotten in pulpits because they are boring, hard to make meaningful, or not popular topics.
If we really want to know the Truth of GOD, we have to study the whole Bible on our own time. One preacher, that I know of, went through the Bible completely and put it into books for posterity. It took him five years. (McGee, www.ttb.org) This still isn't going to solve the problem forever. It has to be updated because of the changes in our society, new discoveries, and technology.
Every person in every generation
has to make a personal study of the Bible
to find out the Truth for themselves.
I have heard of some famous people who have read the entire Bible every year, sometimes more than once. That person will know a lot more than I do, and may know more than some of our preachers. The strength it gives us to know all the different parts of the Bible is beyond our comprehension. I hope you will find time in your life to do better than I have.
Well, my eyes are closing against my will. :-) I better get going.
Think about Jesus today...think about what He went through, about how He may have felt, about why it is so important.
