Do you need the Bible everyday?
My short answer is YES.
But maybe not why or in the way you might think.
When I was in college, I worked part-time as a dental assistant. I met all kinds of people, and when you’re sitting in a room with a person while their mouth is getting good and numb for a procedure, you tend to be on the receiving end of a lot of nervous babble. I often found myself talking with patients about God and faith because for some people going to the dentist is akin to being on your death bed and makes you start self-evaluating and thinking seriously about the afterlife. I had a lot of weird conversations with people, but it gave me a general overview of what southerners living in the Bible Belt think about themselves when it comes to Christianity. The general consensus is that we all love God, He loves us, and as long as we haven’t murdered anyone, we’re going to heaven. I remember one lady telling me that she thought the Church was completely useless to her and that she didn’t need anyone or anything except to just be with God when she wanted to worship. I think I might have asked her, “If you don’t need the Bible or the Church, how do you worship a God you don’t really know?” I remember she wasn’t thrilled with my line of questioning. Generally speaking, many of the people I had conversations with functioned on the presumption that they were good people, and that was their ticket to heaven. But I always wondered–if they thought they were good people, then why did they feel the need to identify themselves as Christians? Why claim to follow Christ if you don’t understand the basic truth about yourself and how much you need Him?
So, just to make sure we’re all on the same page as we kick off this series, let me be up front and probably a little hurtful:
You’re not good.
And I’m especially not good.*
The only good in me comes from Jesus Christ, and if you belong to Him, then the same is true of you.**
Now that we’re past that, let me explain to you why I think we need the Bible every day.
I’m gonna blow you away with the complexity of my theological argument.
Just kidding.
It’s really just this: we need Jesus every day.
I don’t know about you, but I cannot do this Christian life thing on my own. That lady in the dentist’s chair assured me she needed nothing and no one else to be a Christ-follower, but as she spoke about what she thought she believed, the holes in her argument were so large that no truth could be ever be held tightly in a sieve-like belief system such as that. It all runs out because there is nothing to support it. Self-sufficiency isn’t Biblical. It might be attractive (it is to me sometimes), but it is an illusion. Jesus holds everything together–preventing the cosmos from exploding while simultaneously meeting the desperate pleas of our broken hearts. Only God can hold the stars in place and prevent the earth from spinning into the sun while also rescuing people from the destructive pattern of sin and rebellion.
Only God can do that.
Not us.
Never us.
Here’s where this comes from so you know I’m not making it up:
“He (Christ) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For everything was created by Him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and by Him all things hold together. He is also the head of the body, the Church; He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He might come to have first place in everything. For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile everything to Himself by making peace through the blood of His cross—whether things on earth or things in heaven.” (Colossians 1:15-20) (See also Hebrews 2:10)
So what does this have to do with daily Bible intake?
Simple: we need Jesus every day.
We need Him to rescue us from sin as much as we need Him to keep our hearts beating, as much as we need Him to keep our lungs pushing oxygen in and out.
He is the reason we exist and the source of both life and joy. Before the world was spoken into existence, before the galaxies were sprinkled with stars that carry God-given names, before oceans sent foamy waves crashing onto sandy beaches, before a human ever took a breath or laughed or cried—before any of it, God had planned to reveal Himself to creation through words, His words. Through covenants and promises that He made long ago and is still keeping. And then ultimately through Jesus (see John 1). All through the Old Testament, He was sending Jesus. And then He gave the words to us about Jesus’ 33 years on our planet so that we would never forget, so that we would always have proof of His rescue in our hands.
Here’s the truth about knowing this God many of us claim to love and follow: the only way to really know Him is through His chosen method of revelation: the Bible. That was His decision and one that He’s entirely entitled to make. What this means for us is that we need to open the Bible and read it. Read whole books of it, read chapters, read verses in context so we know what the authorial intent was, not just how it makes us feel when we read it. Perhaps the worst place to start when approaching the Bible is to ask how we feel about it. It’s kind of irrelevant how a verse makes us feel unless it inspires us to praise God or draws us towards repentance over sin.
There was a long season of my life in my mid—to-late twenties when I struggled to read my Bible with any consistency. I couldn’t drag myself out of bed in the mornings, I couldn’t seem to “get anything” from it when I did read, and I felt like I was doing okay on my own. I had little spurts of starting and stopping here and there, but usually I wasn’t very loyal. And my faith suffered as a result. There were hard days and longer nights when I needed to feel secure in Christ, but I struggled to know Him rightly. I let my circumstances frame my opinion about God, and many times the opinions I formed were in opposition to what God actually tells us about Himself in the Bible.
Because God is faithful and always keeps His promises, He didn’t let me languish in my ignorance; He disciplined the laziness right out of me. He used some hard stuff, some unlovely methods, some wounds that are still healing. Infertility, fractured relationships, a place of ministry that always felt broken.
But you know what? I’m thankful. Because self-sufficiency wasn’t really working for me. Bitterness had become a default response to pretty much everything in my life, and I was convinced God loved everybody but me. My center was, well, self-centered. Off in so many, many ways. When I realized that just barely scraping by with a spiritual currency of sporadic verse skimming was failing me, I knew that in order to press through difficulty, I needed something substantive, something that would feed my starving soul while also correcting the superfluous chinks in my theological framework. I needed something that could withstand my questions, doubts, fears, selfishness, and uncertainties.
Only God can do that.
Not me.
Never me.
And thus began an open-ended journey to know God in His own words, not mine. To shatter the image I’d given Him, I had to learn to recognize His voice and understand His descriptions. That meant opening the Bible. Regularly. Every day if I could, or at least almost every day. I hope I travel this path for the rest of my life. Jesus, let it be so.
While we’re here, let’s talk about legalism for just a minute. I would by lying if I said I never miss a day of Bible reading. I miss a day here and there when the kids are up too early or when we’re traveling or when I’m so burned out I can’t bring myself to take the medicine I know I need. I don’t have a checklist that I mark off so I can feel like a good little Christian. That’s SO NOT THE POINT. And if you come away from this post thinking that reading the Bible makes you a good Christian, then I have utterly failed you. Being good isn’t the point.
The point is that in the brokenness that is the human heart lies a deep desperation to know and engage with the God who authored life and salvation. We were created to worship Him, though we often replace the intended Person of our worship with anything but Him. To know Him, we have to read our Bibles, plain and simple. Neediness is the point.
Do we need the Bible every day?
Yes, because we need Jesus every day.
We need grace, mercy, peace, love, comfort, strength, presence, joy, forgiveness EVERY DAY. Those things are found in knowing Christ. And to know Christ, you have to do the work of knowing Him in the way He gave us to know Him. There are no shortcuts or alternate routes. There is no quick path to sanctification. Transformation takes work and time. Regular exposure to the Word rightly shapes our view of God, and it shines a good-kind-of-painful light on our desperate need for Jesus to conform us into His image.
If you’re still doubtful, ask yourself these questions:
- How often do you struggle with sin?
- How often do you do the thing you said you wouldn’t do?
- How often do you feel distant from the Lord?
- How often do you feel inadequate or purposeless when it come to living the Christian life?
- How often do you need to be convicted over areas of sin and blind spots?
- How often do you need to be reminded of God’s love for you?
- How often do you need to be humbled and reminded that you are not in charge?
- How often do you need to remember what it means to follow Jesus?
- How often do you need to focus on the character of God?
- How often do you long for a deeper, more intimate relationship with God?
- How often do you want to know what to say about the Lord to an unbelieving friend, family member, or co-worker?
- How often do you want to be able to encourage others who are suffering and hurting?
- How often do you want to know what God says about particular issues?
- How well do you know the God you claim to love?
- How often do you need to remember that Jesus’ work on the cross was enough for you?
If you’re like me, there’s an answer to all of those questions that resonates with regularity. We’ve been given the gift of the Scriptures. Why not dive deep into that gift that will helps us treasure Christ above all else?
:::
This is post #2 in the series “Knowing God in His Own Words”
Next up in this series: {Practically Speaking, How Do I Begin?}
*For further reflection on the depravity of man, which is the more cerebral way of saying we’re all pretty much evil at heart, here are just a few Scriptures of many you can look to:
Mark 7:21-23, 10:18
1 John 1
Romans 3:23, 5:7-19, 11:32
If you need more, this is a helpful, categorized list.
**In light of recent tragic events I feel it necessary to ask you not to confuse my discussion on the depravity of man in any way with the value of life. While I believe all of humanity is fallen and needs Jesus Christ, I also believe all of humanity is created in the image of God and therefore valuable and worthy of our love and respect.
Glenna Marshall is married to her pastor, William, and lives in rural Southeast Missouri where she tries and fails to keep up with her two energetic sons. She is the author of The Promise is His Presence (P&R) and Everyday Faithfulness (Crossway), and Memorizing Scripture (Moody). Connect with her on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
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