~The New Year Has Dawned~
It’s hard to believe, but the 2007 New Year of our Lord is upon us. It just seems like yesterday that it was the year 2000 and we were all worried about our computers crashing, governments shutting down, banks freezing our assets. Many people even wrote books on the subject, letting us know what would happen and how to survive. And what happen? Nothing, everything went normal as it usually does from one year to the next. I forgot who said it, but with God’s help, let me add, “The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.”
In 2006, my wife Martha and I passed a milestone for us, we read the Bible from cover to cover. I’m ashamed to admit it, but we had never read the entire Bible through in one year. We’ve read the Bible many times; the Gospels, the New Testament as well as the Old Testament. We’ve been to Bible studies, taught Bible studies and seminars, heard many sermons, etc……you know what I mean. Not that there is anything magic about us reading the entire Bible in one year. It’s easy to figure out, to know God and to know your Bible you have to read it. After all, the Bible is all about God.
How did we come about to read the Bible in the year 2006? Well the Lord works in mysterious ways. The story starts back in 2005 when God was convicting me of watching too much T.V. You probably know the routine. If not, let me go over it with you. You come home each night after a hard day and tired, eat a large dinner and head for the T.V. With the remote in your hand, the boob-tube keeps you mesmerized until bedtime. And when you finally get up to go to bed you can’t remember anything that you watched that was beneficial to your spiritual life. For me, it was a wasted three or four hours. That’s where I was in 2005.
But God was dealing with me over this waste of His time. So about the middle of 2005 He took care of the problem. Our large 32 inch screen T.V. in the living room crashed, …..it quit working. Well, did I take the hint from God?.......No I didn’t. So what did I do? What any good red-blooded
So sometime early last year one of the things we decided to do was to read the entire Bible in 2006. When looking at the schedule, we knew that to complete the readings we would need to read at least four chapters a day. And that is what we set out to do, but let me say that some days we didn’t read the four chapters and of course some days we read more than four chapters. We started out reading two chapters in the New Testament and two chapters in the Old Testament. That was working, but it didn’t seem that we were getting as much out of it as we should……we were constantly changing subjects. So we adjusted our schedule and read the New Testament first and then started the Old Testament. So the end of the story is, that we finished reading the entire Bible with the last two Books in the Old Testament; Zechariah and Malachi about 7:00 P.M on New Year’s Eve.
I don’t know where you are in your spiritual walk with God. But, let me encourage you in the year 2007 to spend more time with Him, especially with your Bible and in your Prayer Room. I don’t know what you and God have planned? It may be God’s goal for you to read the entire Bible, or go to Church more often, or teach a Bible Study. I just don’t know what God is dealing with you on? That is up to you and God, but let me ask that you be open to His spirit and do the will of the Father.
Therefore, know that Jehovah your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy with them that love Him and keep His commandments, to a thousand generations. (Deuteronomy 7:9 MKJV)
Oh, by the way, the televisions have not been replaced. And I’m reading more spiritual books than ever.
“Have a Great and Blessed 2007”
Brother