Lots of people nowadays are telling you to unplug and just be. They often do this in the context of trying to make you feel guilty about how busy or connected you are. I am not going to say anything in favour of this or against it. I want to encourage you to spend 15 minutes, give or take, on something that when done humbly in light of the Gospel will change your life for the good. I am talking about either reading or listening to the Bible every day. I realize that you can be part of a church and not realize this is an important part of your life with Jesus. Consider these three points:
First, human beings were designed by the Triune God to listen and to speak because God loves us.
From all eternity the Father reveals Himself to the Son and the Son reveals Himself to the Father, both in and by the Spirit. This is at one with the Father, from all eternity, loving the Son and the Son loving the Father, both in and by the Spirit. Out of this unending fullness of love and revelation, Almighty God created all things and made human beings in His image. Among much else, we human beings were made to receive the love and revelation of the Triune God as we respond in open love and speaking to Him. It is in this context that we were designed to love and reveal ourselves to others while receiving their love and revealing. In the Fall, we broke and bent ourselves, and so our relationship with Him, with others, and ourselves is bent or broken, but His image in us is not removed, it is bent.
Second, the Triune God redeems us to restore us.
The Father in his Son, communicated by the Spirit, did all that needed to be done to redeem and reconcile to Himself all who put their trust in Jesus as God’s one and only provision for salvation. Once saved, He longs for us to learn to listen to Him speak and reveal Himself day by day, that we will respond to His words in a worthy manner, speaking to Him in light of who we are and who He is. Through Jesus, we know that the whole counsel of the Triune God is revealed, given to us in the 66 books of the one Bible.
So if we want to be restored to what the Triune God intended us to be, then we need to learn to listen to Him and respond day by day till we see Jesus face to face. “All scripture is breathed out by God, and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man and woman of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the ends of the age” (Matthew 28:18b-20). How shall we then live?
Third, by striving to listen to His word written every day.
I do not know how many words you hear and speak every day. We are all in different seasons of life, and we have different vocations. The stay-at-home-mom with a three-year-old and five-year-old who never stop talking (usually at the same time) and the journalist or counselor all have different demands on listening because of their vocation than the retired empty nester.
So I am not going to lay down a law about how much time to spend in God’s word written. I might say it with apparent great authority, but it would be merely human. The principle of the widow’s mite applies, the 5 minutes spent in the word by that young mom caring for exhausting chatterboxes is probably worth more in the Lord’s eyes then the many people with lots of time under their own control. But remember in a sea of words or for the lonely widow in a sea of silence, we need to hear the Triune God speak to us every day. We were made to hear Him speak and respond in love. He is restoring us for this. He will one day fit us to be in His holy presence receiving from Him and responding for all eternity. So today, try 15 minutes, give or take, letting Him lead. Do the same tomorrow and the day after.
