Reading the Bible

Dear young Christians, you have entered into a true relationship to Christ. His presence is to you a reality. His peace is your consolation, and His joy is your strength. There is a gracious inflow of the life of Christ into your soul that makes you feel like you belong to heaven more than to earth. You have a taste of the love of God and such a consciousness in your heart of His dwelling that you feel like no power can ever separate you from Him.

This is a blessed experience, but let me tell you in all seriousness that your keeping this experience is all in your hands. God will help you keep it. He wants to help you keep it, but there is something for you to do. You must work out your salvation (Philippians 2:12). You need have no tormenting fear about your losing this precious relationship with Jesus; you can keep it, but there is something for you to do that you might keep it. God has a part in the keeping, and His part is done right along every moment you do your part. He is never behind in doing His part. You strike and He strikes with you. You act and He acts with you. You put forth effort and He will put His effort in your effort, and your relationship with heaven is kept inviolate. You want to know the secret of being kept, let me whisper it to your inmost soul, “Daily hide the Word of God in your heart.”

Every Christian knows that the maintenance of his spiritual life depends upon his daily feeding upon the Word of God, yet in the face of this, how very few feed upon it as they should. Not very many people in these days are taking time to feed their souls. God has the food prepared and set before them, but they must eat or starve. It does seem that a great many have gotten past the hunger point.

Our inner peace, our consciousness of Christ’s presence, our power with God, our fellowship with Him, is in exact proportion to our meditation on His Word. This is a fixed, established law in the kingdom of heaven. It is just as certain as that cause produces effect.

Are you conscious of a lack of spiritual strength, of abiding peace? You can set it down as a fact you have not been face to face with God in His Word as often as you should. Are you conscious that Christ is not as real to you as He has been or as He should be, or that you have not that joyous fellowship with Jesus that your soul craves? It is because you have not been as intimate with Christ in His Word as you should have been.

I write unto you, young people, to tell you that you can have a life’s walk with God, but it must be in His Word. God will meet you always in His Word. He will meet you there in prayer; He will meet you there to guide you; He will meet you there to comfort you; He will meet you there to walk and talk with you; He will meet you there face to face.

We want to speak briefly to you of eight secrets of hiding God’s Word in the heart.

1: It is the secret of abiding in Him.

If we fail to feed upon the sincere milk of the Word, ere we are aware we are cut loose from Christ. The branch, that it may not be detached from the vine, must feed upon the vine. The soul, to abide in Jesus, must feast upon His Word. Dear young man, if you value your soul’s spiritual welfare, and the highest enjoyment in the world to come, feed daily upon the living Word. Do not read it and believe it only as a matter of history, but hold it before your heart in meditation until the Spirit imprints it there.

2: It is the secret of prayer.

Not many realize this. They are having difficulty to pray free and joyously as they would like, and they wonder what is the cause. Very probably they have not been feeding on the Word of Christ. The bringing of the Word into the heart kindles the spirit of prayer. A soul well-fed on the living words of Jesus will pray of itself. It walks, breathes, lives in a spirit of prayer. As you open your Bible in the stillness of the early morning and some gracious promise meets your eye, it awakens a prayer in your heart. Or it may be a word of command, and immediately your soul will rise to God imploring His grace. Or it may be a word of warning that is brought to your heart, which will stir the soul to seek a greater refuge in Christ. Or it may be a word bringing hope of a blessed immortality with Jesus, which will gladden the heart with the prayer of thanksgiving. The young man or woman who knows God as revealed in His Word is mighty in prayer.

3: It is the secret of peace.

The Word of God is a word of peace. Those who love His law have great peace. To hearken to the commands of the Lord is to have peace like a river. If your heart is troubled, turn in faith to some promise, and sweet peace will come stealing in, quieting every wave. When there is a raging storm on the sea of life, turn to the blessed Bible and you will hear a voice saying, “Peace, be still.”* (Mark 4:39)

4: It is the secret of purity.

“The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.”* (Psalm 12:6) To keep the fountain of your life pure, keep it filled with the pure Word of Christ. The life that flows from a heart in which the Word of Christ is dwelling richly is a pure life. The mind that is well stored with the Word of God is not troubled with vain and impure thoughts.

5: It is the secret of strength.

Would you be strong, young man or young woman, to resist temptation and keep your soul a conqueror over sin, the world, Satan, and self? Then feed your heart daily on the Word of God. Jesus met the tempter with the Word. There is power in the gospel of Christ. There is power to make you an overcomer in all the battles of life. Oh, how our heart has been made to weep at beholding the weakness of many of God’s children. Some are too weak to testify in public, or to pray, or teach a Sunday School class. A few good feedings upon the Word of God will put strength in them. Your power to do the work of God is in proportion to your feeding on the words of Christ.

6: It is the secret of perception.

If you would have a clear view of the true path of life, read the Bible very much. It will be a light to guide your feet. In these days we need to keep a keen spiritual perception. Keep Christ in view. Keep heaven in view. Keep your title to a mansion in the skies where you can read it clearly. We are exhorted to have spiritual understanding (Colossians 1:9). The way to have it is to hide God’s Word in the heart. If you will give yourself to daily thought and prayerful meditation on the Word of Christ, you will have better understanding of spiritual things than many theologians. Never can man, with all his intellectual capacity, have spiritual understanding by judging from things natural.

7: It is the secret of guidance.

There are many by-paths and pitfalls lying close along the path of life. We need the guidance of the blessed Bible. A certain pastor said to a young sister that there was no harm in going to see a certain show in a theater. The young sister replied, “There is something in my heart that reads differently.” What was it that read differently? It was the law of God. Have you made a study of the picture in the heading of the little paper The Path of Life? The young girl is walking the true pathway. The celestial city is at the ending of the way. She has the Bible in her hand and she is reading it. There are mountains of difficulties on the left hand and deep pitfalls on the right hand, but her pathway lies straight between. By her following the Bible, she will keep clear from both. Read and meditate much in the law of the Lord and you will be kept from the by-paths of worldliness and sin.

8: It is the secret of spiritual growth.

“As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.”* (1 Peter 2:2) There is no need of backsliding. There is no necessity of spiritual declension. By the daily hiding of God’s Word in the heart, you will grow stronger and stronger in the spiritual life. You see a young man or woman who is a real stalwart saint—and thank God there are some—and they will tell you that the secret of their strength is the spending of much time in reading and meditating on the law of God.

In conclusion, let me say a word about how to read the Bible. Upon taking up the Book to read, lift your heart to God for a moment imploring the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit.

Yield the whole heart to God; open the door wide that the truth might enter in.

Meditate on each text. Is it a warning? If so, do I heed it? Is it a command? If so, do I obey it? Is it a promise? If so, do I believe it and fully rely upon it? Does it teach some heart experience? If so, do I enjoy the experience?

As you close your Bible, again breathe an earnest prayer that the Holy Spirit will enable you to reproduce in your life the truth you have read today. It is the careful practicing of the Word that fixes it deep in the heart.