February’s Verse
01/02/11 13:38 Filed in: Bible
We live in a world where there is a constant din and hubbub of competing voices offering advice on what life is about and how to live it—self help groups, life coaches, tv talk shows, the list goes on. But theories change, one guru contradicts another—are we left just to find our own truth, surely there has to be something better than that?
Like last year, our church and Letterkenny Baptist church gave out a calendar around Letterkenny. The verses on this year’s calendar are all about God’s word. February’s verse points us to the answer to our questions:
“Every word of God is flawless; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him” – Proverbs 30:5
Perhaps we regard such a claim with jaded cynicism, we’ve been stung once to often, and we won’t get caught again. This verse is from the book of Proverbs in the Bible—a collection of sayings put together by King Solomon, many of them his own, some collected from other sources. Solomon’s sayings aren’t the trite little phrases of a naïve young fool; instead they were put together towards the end of his life as a gift for his sons, passing on lessons that he wanted them to learn. In particular they were lessons he had tried and tested, lessons from his experience, rather than simply grandiose claims.
Solomon had been around enough corners in life, and tried to find his pleasure and purpose in all the wrong places, and it is his conclusion that all the promises of wealth, fame, pleasure are worthless—there is only one set of promises that are flawless and they come from God. He had tasted sorrow as well as success, and found only one certain refuge, one stronghold that could keep him going—God’s word.
So this verse isn’t just a nice sentiment, but the words of a craggy-faced old man, who had experienced all of life, wanting to pass on to succeeding generations something worthwhile that he had learned from it all. He had tested other words and ways to live, and they had failed, and he had returned to the ways God set down in his word. And his advice to us, ringing down through the centuries is that God’s word is to be trusted and followed, for in it you find the way to safety and security in a world of uncertainty.
The sad thing I find is that many people leave the Bible unread, and spend their lives searching in the wrong places for the security and refuge that only it flawlessly promises.
Like last year, our church and Letterkenny Baptist church gave out a calendar around Letterkenny. The verses on this year’s calendar are all about God’s word. February’s verse points us to the answer to our questions:
“Every word of God is flawless; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him” – Proverbs 30:5
Perhaps we regard such a claim with jaded cynicism, we’ve been stung once to often, and we won’t get caught again. This verse is from the book of Proverbs in the Bible—a collection of sayings put together by King Solomon, many of them his own, some collected from other sources. Solomon’s sayings aren’t the trite little phrases of a naïve young fool; instead they were put together towards the end of his life as a gift for his sons, passing on lessons that he wanted them to learn. In particular they were lessons he had tried and tested, lessons from his experience, rather than simply grandiose claims.
Solomon had been around enough corners in life, and tried to find his pleasure and purpose in all the wrong places, and it is his conclusion that all the promises of wealth, fame, pleasure are worthless—there is only one set of promises that are flawless and they come from God. He had tasted sorrow as well as success, and found only one certain refuge, one stronghold that could keep him going—God’s word.
So this verse isn’t just a nice sentiment, but the words of a craggy-faced old man, who had experienced all of life, wanting to pass on to succeeding generations something worthwhile that he had learned from it all. He had tested other words and ways to live, and they had failed, and he had returned to the ways God set down in his word. And his advice to us, ringing down through the centuries is that God’s word is to be trusted and followed, for in it you find the way to safety and security in a world of uncertainty.
The sad thing I find is that many people leave the Bible unread, and spend their lives searching in the wrong places for the security and refuge that only it flawlessly promises.