One of the supreme dangers of giving oneself to the exegetical details of the biblical text and doctrine is you can become an expert on the Bible, but not realize what the Bible is saying to you personally. This next Sunday I'll be preaching from Colossians 3:19 where the text tells husbands to love their wives and not to become embittered against them. I can delve into the text with precision and accuracy, which I do, without realizing that God is talking to me personally. I came to realize the text was exposing weaknesses in me as a husband that need repentance and correction.

I think a lot of us are like that. We agree with the admonition to be “workmen&women that need not to be ashamed,” but we don't pay much attention to the next part “rightly dividing the word of truth.” I think the phrase “rightly dividing” means more than just accuracy…it also means coming face to face with what God is saying to us personally. Sometimes it might be because we don't like the personal confrontation with God…sometimes because we want to “straighten out” someone else…but many times we need to be reminded again and again—my Lord Jesus is speaking to me and no one else in the room…it's not primarily about accuracy, it's about what is God saying to me.

Today's My Utmost for His Highest reminds us this very thing:

Martha believed in the power at the disposal of Jesus Christ. She believed that Jesus could have healed her brother, Lazarus, if only Jesus had been present when Lazarus was dying (John 11:21). She also believed that Jesus had a unique relationship with God and that whatever Jesus asked of God, God would do. But Martha needed a closer personal intimacy with Jesus; her program of belief was entirely focused on future fulfillment. When Jesus told her that Lazarus would rise again, she replied, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day” (v. 24). Jesus wanted her belief to be rooted in the present moment; he wanted her faith to be a personal possession, and he asked a question that led her to a new understanding: “Do you believe?”

Is there something similar in the Lord's current dealings with you? Is Jesus educating you into personal intimacy with him? Let him drive his questions home: “Do you believe? What is your ordeal of doubt?” Have you, like Martha, come to some overwhelming moment in your circumstances, a moment when your program of belief is about to become personal belief? This can never take place until a personal need arises out of a personal problem.

To believe is to commit. If I have a program of belief, I commit myself to a certain set of ideas or principles and abandon all that is not related to them. In personal belief, I commit myself morally to confidence in the person of Jesus Christ and refuse to compromise. I commit myself spiritually to the Lord, and determine that, in this particular thing, I will be dominated by him.

I was reminded of the passage from James 1:23-24 -- 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; 24 for once he looked at himself and has gone away, he immediately forgot what kind of person he was.

My prayer for you and me this day is this: Lord we don't want to be those who just study and hear but then walk away from our study not realizing You are speaking to us to reprove, critique our hearts, instruct us personally. We want to be accurate, but more than that, we want You to dominate our lives. We love Your word. Amen

Walk with the King today and be a blessing.