God-Breathed

"All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."
—II Timothy 3:16, 17  NIV

How do you hear God?

I know that I hear God through His word. So making time for reading and absorbing God's word is a non-negotiable. If I want to truly be alive in Him, I must let His word permeate my heart and soul, to let Him breath life into me so I may be truly alive to the things of God.

"All scripture is God-breathed..." I thought about this the other day and what came to mind was somewhere else that "God breathed." I traveled clear back from II Timothy in the New Testament to the very beginning of the Old Testament. To the very start of man's journey on earth.

"When the Lord God made the earth and the heavens—and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground, but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground—the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."  —Genesis 2:4b-7

"...the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."

Could the breath of God that gives life to man—to me—give life to ink on a page? That the life in God's Word goes beyond what can be explained solely through exegesis. That when it gets worked into the right now's and split wide open by the details of what we're facing that it spills out as something that's never been before. That God shows up and breaths Himself into our world when His word is opened and invited—no, more than invited—inhaled so that just as our blood stream carries the oxygen we need to live, the Spirit carries life in it's fullness in our innermost parts.

I wonder if when I open God's Word and read it, but maybe I'm not gripped by it as I often am. That in those times of opening and reading it, even if I don't feel changed, even if I don't understand something new or gain some insight that I have immediate use for, that even when nothing seemingly "happens," that really God somehow breaths life into me in spite of what I think and feel.

I'm not talking magic, but I am talking mystery. Maybe there's something that happens when I'm holding His word and drinking of it that satisfies an unnamed thirst, that revitalizes places in me that I don't even realize needed rejuvenated. And so, I must come again and again to feast on God's word.

I desire that I am moved and instructed and shaped and transformed. Will I trust that God is doing work in me with His word even when I can't express how what I'm reading applies to what I'm going through or what He wants me to know of Him. Could God even do some fantastic thing on the molecular, nano-level merely by me sitting and reading His word aloud? I wonder, and I don't doubt it.

So when someone tells me that I read the Bible, but it doesn't say much to me, I think about how His word is God breathed and if God's breath can bring dust alive, what can it do to the man or woman who sits awhile and reads it and invites the Holy Spirit to do a work in them.

And I do ask the Holy Spirit to give me understanding, and if not understanding to somehow bring the word alive so I might might be changed.

For it's not just the familiar passages, the snippets of scripture that are oft-quoted that are beneficial, but ALL scripture is. All scripture is God-breathed and is useful. It all equips us for good work. God's word leads to good action. God's breathes His word into us and we become people fully alive to Him and fully equipped to live for Him.

So sitting and reading His word isn't just a passive thing—His word is active and alive. It infuses me with God's life which is true life, Kingdom life. How can I not look forward to the next time I can read God's word?

And to the occasions when good teachers help unlock its meaning. To the moments when someone shares a bit of scripture that God prompts them to share. For these words are indeed Life to me.

And even when I sit and read wait, but don't perceive that God is doing something, can I rejoice that I'm hearing His word and, still, He's somehow breathing life into me?

As I open my Bible and trace the paths that millions have trod before—through Genesis and Isaiah, through the gospels to the the prison letters and beyond—I trust and believe God's Spirit is doing a great work in me. I can trust that every minute I give to the wearing down paths through these pages, God IS breathing His life into me. 

Yes, a well-worn Bible is where God's Life is breathed into me. So that I might be what God desires "a living being" to be.