On the Cutting Edge

"For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12).

I got a paper cut the other day. Nothing particularly unusual—except ironically I cut my hand while opening a box of bandages! Things turned out pretty well, actually. The remedy was at hand as soon as the hurt occurred.

Did you ever open the Bible expecting to find a bandage, and instead you discovered its cutting edge? You came expecting comfort, and you found conviction? You came seeking a soothing salve, and instead found a sword? The Bible isn't a tame, passive book full of benign, fine-sounding platitudes. It's sharp, alive, edgy. It pokes, prods, and penetrates. And like a surgeon's scalpel, it hurts in order to heal.

That's why it sounds a bit strange when Christians talk about "doing devotions"—as if Bible study could be reduced to a safe, controlled formula. I have never found any Bible verses that tell us to "do devotions." Now, don't misunderstand. The Bible does urge us to fill our minds with God's Word and to pray without ceasing. Countless believers find great value in systematic daily Bible reading and prayer. We need the discipline. Daily devotions nourish us with spiritual food. But my point is simply this: while it's good to "have devotions," it's even better to "be devoted."

Late in King David's life, he called together the leaders of Israel and exhorted them to be faithful to God. He said, "Now devote your heart and soul to seeking the Lord your God" (1 Chronicles 22:19). Then he turned to his son Solomon, the heir-apparent to the throne, and urged, "Acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind" (1 Chronicles 28:9). Members of the early church "devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer" (Acts 2:42). Paul wrote, "Be devoted to one another in brotherly love" (Romans 12:10). He urged Timothy, "Devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching" (1 Timothy 4:13), and he told Titus, "Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good" (Titus 3:14).

How devoted are we? Walk into any Christian bookstore and you can find a wide variety of Bibles for sale, so many that it's hard to decide which one to buy. (When is the last time you thanked God for the availability of his Word in your own language?) Yet with all our Bibles, America continues to stumble down a dangerous path toward biblical illiteracy. It isn't enough just to own a Bible, even a thick one with lots of study helps. We need to read, absorb, and live it, letting the Word do its spiritual surgery in us.

Could there even be a certain danger in the proliferation of study Bibles? Why reflect on how a passage of Scripture applies to your life if someone else—a scholar, no less—has already done it for you? And does the niche-marketing of devotional Bibles tend to tailor the Bible to fit us, instead of compelling us to tailor ourselves to the Bible?

Devotion to God isn't just something we do 15 minutes a day. It should describe who we are. Because the best Bible translation is the one that translates it into action.