‘God will bless you for doing it.’ James 1:25 NLT
Dr David Jeremiah tells of a well-known seminary professor who spent a summer studying in Jerusalem. In his apartment building lived an orthodox Jewish rabbi with whom he studied Hebrew throughout the summer. One day the professor sat and listened to his Jewish friend recite the entire book of Psalms, in Hebrew, without missing a word. Now that’s pretty impressive, right?
But God doesn’t bless you for merely reading His Word, or memorising it, or even being able to repeat it word for word in the original languages. God only promises to bless those who ‘do’ what His Word says. Reading your Bible without putting it into practice is like going into a good restaurant and eating the menu while ignoring the meal.
‘Don’t just listen to God’s Word… do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. For if you listen to the Word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror. You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like. But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.’ (James 1:22–25 NLT)
One of the dangers of enjoying great preaching is that you can enjoy it and go home intellectually or emotionally moved but spiritually unchanged. The knowledge of God’s Word is vitally important. But a ‘head knowledge’ of the Scriptures can actually water a root of spiritual pride in your heart whereby you applaud the Scriptures but don’t apply them. So the word for today is—‘do’ God’s Word!
SoulFood: Num 7, Mark 5:11–20, Ps 94:12–23, Pr 10:27
The Word for Today is authored by Bob and Debby Gass and published under licence from UCB International Copyright ©