Boots and Bibles

I picked up a nice new pair of Ariat lacers today at a horse expo. My previous pair should have had a few more years of life in them, but shortly after I got them, I was helping at a horse show where I had to stand in an arena full of sloppy, wet mud. The boots were never quite the same after that.

When I thought about my old boots and the new pair, I was reminded of a message I heard from a pastor over twenty years ago. Funny how some things stick with you. He told about a time when as a young man in college, he had gotten hired as a construction worker and purchased a brand new pair of work boots for the job.

He had never worked construction and was feeling a bit unsure of himself. As he prepared to leave for his first day on the job, he looked down at the boots and realized that their newness was like a neon sign proclaiming his inexperience. Not wanting the other workers to know that, he went outside and scooped up handfuls of dirt and rubbed them over the boots.

The boots were now a little dusty, but they still looked pretty new. About the only way to really make boots look used is to use them. Then the pastor asked everyone to hold up their Bibles and take a look at them.

What does your Bible look like? Does it have that brand new, right-off-the-bookstore shelf look that announces to everyone that you haven’t been using it? Or is it lovingly worn from months or years of soul-searching study? Perhaps even stained with a few tears.

Psalm 119:72 says “The law from your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold.” Do we believe that? If we really valued God’s word that highly, wouldn’t we spend more time in it?

I’d venture to say that many, or maybe most of us, spend more time each day on things that have little or no eternal value, than we do in studying God’s word. For some it may be texting, Facebook, Twitter, internet, TV, shopping, etc. but we probably all have something we could give up or cut back on to make more time for reading our Bibles and learning from the Creator of the universe.