Bible Study or Divine Reading?

How do we read the Bible, when today most of us read for information and entertainment? Have we lost the art of spiritual reading? The Bible is very much alive! It is a nonfiction storybook of God’s interaction with humans. Instead of interpreting it, we need to let it interpret us.

I don’t want to simply read scripture to find out how to get God into my life, or acquire facts about God, or develop principles to live by—nor to gather information and cover territory. There is a time and place for reading God’s word informationally, but life transformation happens when God’s Word is read formationally, as one awake, with reverence and a vulnerable heart. I want to read to be formed and transformed—hoping to be nourished by the richness hidden in the words. I read with an open heart, awaiting God’s touch, desiring to sit in His lap. I read with my entire life—my heart’s response. Scripture becomes interior to my life, overflowing in ways of love.

Scripture is God-breathed—and has power to breathe God’s spirit into us. Though it’s done being written, it’s not done writing—“for we are a letter of Christ written not with ink but with the Spirit of the Living God” (II Cor 3:3). It writes its truths on our hearts, speaking its words into new situations and our current times. But listening is the key.

“Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10).