As we grow in our Christian lives there are certain servants of God that make indelible impacts on our lives...Pastors, teachers, educators that we have learned to trust and even become dependent upon to teach us God's word. I have at least six such Bible teachers that I rely upon often...most likely, so do you. The problem comes when we begin to rely upon them rather than getting alone with God and His Word and seeing for ourselves what God is revealing to us . An additional problem comes when God takes these trusted Bible teachers away from us through death or perhaps other circumstances. We may feel a void because we have depended upon their feeding us for a long time. Believers must understand a weaning process that must take place. We thank God for these teachers, but we must not prioritize them over going into the Scriptures to seek God's ways for ourselves. A sort of “weaning” process should be taking place. Webster defines “weaning” as: “to detach from a source of dependence.” Faithful Bible teachers are a gift from God, but they are to deflect from themselves and direct us to a deeper personal relationship with the Lord Jesus. Faithful Bible teachers must be seen as men like John the Baptist, “I am a voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘make straight the way of the Lord.” “This One is He who comes after me, of whom I am not worthy to untie the strap of His sandal.” (John 1:23-27)

We must always be careful not to lock unto the teachings of a man rather than seeking God's face through our own Bible study and prayer. Sometimes I think we just get lazy and depend upon someone else's study and work rather than doing the heavy lifting of personal Bible study “accurately handling the Word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15). My prayer for you and me this day is this: Lord, we are so thankful that You have brought faithful expositors of Your word into our lives. We have grown in our knowledge of You through them. But we realize that we must take on the personal responsibility of standing on our own...being “weaned”...and learning from You personally through Your word. To that end we pray and we will commit ourselves to “Be diligent to present ourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed” (2 Timothy 2:15). Amen

Walk with the King today and be a blessing.