Our First True Love - Part 3

True love is the foundation upon which we, as Christian women (young and old), live and base the whole of our being. This unconditional love brings us to a place far higher and brighter than anything we could have thought or dreamed.

Of course, we realize the basis and beginning of True Love was when our precious Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, came down to this earth and lived a perfect, sinless life, only to sacrifice it on a cross to pay the penalty for our sins. (John 3:16) Our admittance of our own unworthy sinfulness, our belief in Christ's sacrifice, and our confession of accepting Christ as our own personal Savior, opens the door to a new, rich and beautiful life of abiding in Christ, our first True Love.

But this is only the first step - the "marriage". We now have a whole life before us to live. Each day will be spent either in pulling away (doubt) or in drawing near (faithful trust) to our True Love. Doubtless, we all want to live in constant harmony and unity with our spiritual Husband ("For thy Maker is thine husband; the Lord of hosts is his name;" Isaiah 54:5), but how do we go about doing so? Unlike an earthly husband, the Lord does not talk to us face to face. Neither can we live with and relate to Him as we would an earthly husband. Some of us may even hesitate to think such an intimate relationship with Christ is possible.

Recently, the Lord has shown me three important steps to gaining and maintaining an intimate relationship with Christ. In fact, He has shown me that without these three things, it is impossible to grow in my relationship with Him. They are reading God's Word, memorizing the Scriptures, and meditating or studying the Bible. Today, we will look at the first step: reading God's Word.

For most of us, reading our Bible is a no-brainer, but I have a question: How often do we read our Bibles through? Some of us can happily answer that we read it through once or twice a year. Others of us blush to think of the one or two times we have actually read it through. Another question: How many books or 

movies have we read/watched in that time period? A pastor once challenged the people of his church not to read any books or watch any movies until they had spent time that day in God's Word. Another pastor asked, "If we read God's Word as much as we read men's, what would our lives be like?" It is not necessary to throw all books and movies away, but we do need to realize the amount of time spent in partaking of them in comparison to time spent in God's Word. We need to regularly evaluate how much we read God's Word compared with the amount of we spend doing other things. Is God pleased?

Neglecting God's Word is one of the biggest hindrances in our quest for having Christ as our first True Love. How can we better love and serve God if we are not continually in His Word? Reading God's Word is God talking to us. If we're not listening (reading), how can He make His will and His amazing love known to us?

I can read through a Nancy Drew book in an hour and many of them in the course of a day. Once, I read thirty-two Nancy Drew books and seven others in a week. What kind of a blessing did I miss out on by neglecting God's Word in favor of such profitless reading?

On average, a "slow reader" reads about 200 words per minute. In this case, one hour per day in reading God's Word would result in finishing the Bible in about sixty days. Thus six times per year. If you're really slow like me, let's say 150 words per minute, it would take eighty days, enabling the reader to cover the entire Bible four and one half times per year. That's in just one hour per day! If we spent thirty minutes in Bible reading each morning and thirty in the evening, we'd be reading through in no time. The more we read God's Word, the more we will know about Him, the more He can show us, and the more His Word is instilled into our hearts and minds, ready to pop up when we need them. Whether it is in times of witnessing, times when we need to make a decision, or in times of desperation, His Word, which we have read, will make themselves known in our need.

Let me encourage each of us to take time to read through Psalm 119. Each time we come across anything that talks about God's Word (statutes, judgments, commandments, law, precepts, etc.), write it down. It will really open our eyes to the importance of His Word. May God bless each of us as we learn to live in harmony and intimacy with our first True Love.

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Posts from the Past

Every Wednesday I post something that I have written in the past. It may have been written a long time ago, or a very, very long tim ago! :-D So please forgive any mistakes!