Friday, April 10, 2009

THE WRITTEN WORD: A FRESH BLESSING -- Devotional for April 10, from "Good Seeds"

Then the Lord answered and said to me, “Record the vision, and inscribe it on tablets, that the one who reads it may run." (Habakkuk 2:2)

Francis Bacon wrote, “Reading maketh a full man, writing, an exact man.” Commenting on the second part of that quote, I came up with this little rhyme: Not writing, my brain becomes lazy; gone the thoughts I should have stored. Ideas and prayers get all hazy, that I don’t take time to record. It is difficult to imagine a world without reading and writing. Though these are surely inventions of man, they are certainly in keeping with the image of God in which man is made. We read about Moses coming down from communing with God on a mountain, carrying with him the Law written by “the finger of God” on tablets of stone. God is a communicator, and we follow suit. We are creatures of intricate language, which we instinctively use and pass on. A newborn is already familiar with the sound of its mother’s voice. And look how quickly and naturally an infant learns, by hearing, to speak and understand. Listening and talking are intrinsic to being human. But what about reading and writing? Some cultures today are still entirely illiterate. Are such people groups inferior to others? No, it’s just a matter of having written language introduced to them. This is something that Wycliffe Bible Translators and other such groups are currently doing in some of the out of the way places of the world. They send in highly trained linguists who befriend the people, get to know their culture, learn to communicate with them in their spoken language, and then gradually develop a written language for them that they will soon be taught to read. God communes with mankind heart to heart, but also seeks to communicate voice to ear and script to sight. Peter wrote, “Men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God” (II Peter 1:21). But God told the prophet Habakkuk that His intention was for men to write down for the many what He has revealed to the few. The Bible is the result of following the divine injunction to “record the vision.” What does this mean for you and me? First: to take advantage of the written Word of God, teaching others to read, and then giving them eternal, soul-nourishing content to feast their eyes and minds upon. When was the last time you gave someone written material about eternal truth? Second: to use writing to train ourselves and others in the ways of God. Write down your thoughts, plans and prayers; write personal notes of encouragement to friends, flowing with God’s precious promises. And what about writing a letter to God? The written word outlasts the moment, as a fresh blessing to the reader!

No comments:

Post a Comment