Light the Lamp!
Psalm 119:105
If you have ever driven in a fog before you will understand the setting I am about to describe. Two of my sons and I were headed home from Kansas City from seeing a baseball game. It was a doubleheader and of course we wanted to see both games. In between the 2 games it rained over an hour putting the game into rain delay. We headed home to Wichita where we lived at the time and it was about a two hour drive. 2nd game didn’t end until about 10:30 PM. About halfway home things got bad. A heavy fog began to roll in and before I knew it, I couldn’t see 20 feet in front of me. I turned my lights on bright but it just didn’t help. Just too much fog.
So I had to drive the remainder of the trip very slowly hoping other cars could see me even though I couldn’t see anyone.
My guess is that every one of us have a story like that. Yours would probably top mine if I had you stand up and share right now.
You likely heard about the terrible tragedy on I-75 just a couple of weeks ago killing 10 people. The accident was blamed on a brush fire that created a large amount of smoke…12 cars and 7 semis were involved. Bottom line…too much smoke. Not enough light. It was 4 AM. People can get hurt, accidents can happen, the results can even be tragic. At a minimum when we live life in the dark we can get lost and lose our way. We’ve all been there…maybe not to the extent I have just described but we’ve all been in the dark before. Maybe you missed your Progress Energy payment or maybe like our family, you lost power in one of the many storms we have in Florida. It doesn’t take long before I grow weary of it. You can only play monopoly with a flashlight for so long.
The Psalmist David discovered early in life that walking around in the dark is tough. David had his share of tragedy. His infant son died when the baby was only a few days old. He also caused a lot of trouble for himself. He committed adultery, was responsible for the murder of Bathsheba’s husband, yet the Bible calls him a man after God’s heart. He definitely had his share of darkness but at some point David stepped into the light. And perhaps at that moment he wrote down this verse.
Psalm 119:105.
This happens to be one of those verses out of the OT that we have a good idea of what inspired David to write this. In the OT, we are looking at about 4000 years ago when we look at this passage. With no electric lights they had to make the most of the daylight each day. There was still a lot of work to be completed at night. And they needed some way of navigating through the darkness. So they used lamps made of clay that held oil in them and they would light the oil. One place I read said they had a way of attaching these to their sandals. Not likely. They were used throughout the OT and in the NT as well. These were used in David’s day and is most likely what he is describing here. Now this is what I want you to really get this morning…..
THE BIG TRUTH
If you don’t want to walk around in darkness for the rest of your life, you better learn where the light switch is and how to turn it on. Because God’s light is the only light we have.
Think with me about what the passage says to us today. When David said thy word is a lamp he was no doubt referring to two things (1) God’s voice and (2) God’s writings. God spoke to men and women in the OT in several ways-through dreams, visions, and He spoke audibly. They heard His voice. David had access to some of the OT that had been written on scrolls but of course he didn’t have any of the NT like we do. For us, it’s all right here. David also had God’s voice…that’s not the way He speaks today. Doesn’t mean that He can’t, He just chooses not to. He can do as He pleases but now He has given us the complete, inspired word of God—all right here, right at our fingertips and for many of us we hardly ever open it. That’s strange.
It’s strange that we choose to walk around in the dark when there is so much light available to us. Listen, let me tell you something I think you already know but you may need a reminder today. If you plan to go deeper in your walk with Christ, you cannot succeed without God’s word. David couldn’t. Paul couldn’t. John couldn’t. And neither can you.
God spoke to Joshua early in the scripture and said this …Joshua 1:8 NLT. “Study this book of Instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night so you will be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do. Only then. There is no other way. There is no path to success except through God’s word. Why? Because without it we are in darkness.
Some of you have heard the commercials on the radio and TV for Motel 6. This is Tom Bodet and we’ll leave the light on for you. You have had someone arriving late one evening and so you said I’ll leave the light on for you. I want to give you a few things today that will help you turn the light back on for you in Bible reading or perhaps turn it on for the very first time.
1. Pray. Prayer is the light switch. Never begin reading God’s word until you pray first. Bible study and prayer always go hand in hand. Do not expect to get very much from God’s word if you do not begin with prayer. Here is the way I see it. God’s word is a lamp to our feet; a light to our path. Prayer is what turns the light on.
I love to read. I probably have close to 2000 books in my library. But there is only one book that I read that I always pray beforehand and that’s this one. Why? Because I believe prayer turns the light on.
2. Find a translation that YOU enjoy. I have a Bible program with 14 translations on it. If you do not enjoy reading the Bible, it could be because you don’t have a translation that you enjoy. If you need help go to the internet or just ask.
3. Make it a goal to read through the Bible at least once in your lifetime. From Genesis to Revelation. It is the most popular book on the market. More copies sold than any other book in the world. But I suspect that for many people it is the one book on your shelf you have not read completely. You started but you didn’t finish.
4. Read for quality rather than quantity. It is a good thing to read the Bible completely through but this I something we should all remember.
It matters not how many times that you read the Bible THROUGH, it does matter how many times the Bible has been THROUGH you.
5. Develop a plan for reading. Read it a book at a time. A great plan is to begin by reading 3 of the NT books. Here is what I suggest.
• Read the gospel of Mark. It tells us the story of Jesus.
• Read the book of Acts. It tells us how the church got started and more.
• Read the book of Romans. Tells us what we should believe. Full of doctrine.
So get a plan. Without one you will never stay with it.
6. Ask God to give you something to take with you for the day. Something to live by. More than anything God’s word must come and live inside of us. When you make decisions, when you go about your daily routine, when you give advice to ther people, it is God’s word that should be guiding you …every step of the way.
Twice in the OT we find the story of a man named Hill-KEY-ah. He was a priest. In 586 BC, the 1st temple was destroyed. 50 years later the King decided to rebuild it. They took the money that had been brought into the temple that had been collected in the offerings and they gave it to the men who would be supervising the work. Then they paid the workers to repair and restore the temple. They went to work.
The Bible tells us that while they were bringing out the money that had been taken into the temple that Hill-Key-Ah the priest found the book of the law….the very one that had been given through Moses. He then announced “I have found the book of the law in the temple of the Lord.” For something to be found it had to have been lost. What was it like during that time? Because when something is lost we tend to forget about it and sometimes it loses its importance to us. Here’s my point. You may have lost your Bible. You say well I know exactly where it is. But that’s not what I mean. You’ve stopped reading it. Stopped thinking about it. Or maybe you never started. I want to encourage you today to find it again or for the first time.
