We Are Not Alone

In Luke 4, Jesus was tempted by Satan and Jesus kept Satan at bay. He kept Satan from successfully tempting him by reciting scripture back at him. He didn't use the power and wrath that he had as the Son of God to fend him off but instead he used scripture. Every time Satan tempted Jesus he quoted from Deuteronomy. What if the only thing between us and Satan's temptations was our knowledge of scripture from Deuteronomy?  I don't know if many of us would be successful.

Reading God's Word is essential to our growth, 1 Peter 2:2 "Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation"

Reading God's Word is also essential to our maturity, Hebrews 5:11-14 "About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil."

But even with all that said,.we still make up excuses: "I'm too tired" "I gotta get up early in the morning" "I don't have the mental focus after such a long day to read" etc. We even get discouraged when reading because we aren't getting or seeing the same things everyone else seems to be getting out of scripture. These could be frustrating. I know because I've said all of these at some point.

But here is some advice, whenever we start making these excuses in our minds we have to really think about how high reading God's word is on our priority list. The answer: it has to be top priority.

Now some encouragement, we are not alone when we read scripture. All though out man-kind God has become more and more intimate with us. First, there was the Tabernacle. Then God took on flesh and walked among us. Now God's very Spirit dwells in us. We are not alone when we read scripture because we have the Holy Spirit. Anyone can read scripture but if you have the Spirit you are able to understand it. All this takes time and learning though. But God has given us more than enough by giving us His word. We are to use this Bible we have in our hands to keep Satan at bay and to ultimately have a closer and richer relationship with God.