Reason 8: Eternal Life Depends on It!
Yes, there are many important reasons and benefits in reading the Bible and reading it regularly.
- It works. And it works like nothing else!
- It is for OUR good!
- The Bible is the surest and purest voice of God.
- As the surest and purest voice of God, the Bible is the easiest and most dependable way to hear His Voice.
- The Bible is where we find the answer to, from God's point of view, the personal purpose and meaning of life.
- The Bible is the only active, living, personal book.
- The Bible details the promises of God and the conditions for receiving, protecting and growing in and by them.
But all of these blessings are predicated on what the Bible tells us is its ultimate foundational benefit:
He chose to give us birth through the word of truth.
For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.
Jesus promised:
“I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.”
“I tell you the truth, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.”
And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit.
Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.
Any thought, notion or teaching that saving faith occurs apart from God’s Word contradicts the Bible. Just as it is necessary to on-going life and growth, the Word of God (the Bible) is absolutely vital to initial saving faith.
It is by grace you have been saved . . . For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith . . .
And a vital part of this grace and resulting faith is the Word of God. We may have been told and believed, rather than having read it ourselves, but it nonetheless is true that what we heard, to be effective to saving faith, must have been from the Bible, not the words of any man.
There is a clear pattern and process to God’s salvation even if not (and it likely is not) understood as it is occurring:
- A person faces some unsettling issue in life: it may be death of a loved one, a physical, relational, financial . . . difficulty, a psychological awareness of life’s finiteness and the resulting fear of the future and eternal unknown, the sense of a seeming purposelessness of life . . . there are many possible catalysts. For, as the Bible tells us:
Like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be recovered, so we must die. But God does not take away life; instead, he devises ways [this is His grace] so that a banished person may not remain estranged from him.
Or, as the great hymn Amazing Grace relates the same principle:
'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear
And grace my fears relieved
God uses and takes advantage of many potential crises to save people because we certainly cannot save ourselves!
- The person facing a significant issue in life, if they are to be saved, will look for an answer rather than wallow in pity, let time heal (if it can) or dull the pain or unrest, live by making others around them miserable . . . they seek real help.
- Among the many likely answers and advice, at some point (if a person is to be healed) they will be presented with Jesus Christ (by God’s grace), by someone, as a source of hope.
- The person humbles himself (with God’s “devised” help – grace) to ask for and seek His offer of help (as found in the Bible).
- The hurting unsaved person will “try” Jesus in a manner and way detailed in the Bible (the Bible warns there are many false “Jesuses,” and related worthless “truths” espoused by them, in the world and in other books). At this point, the person may not know the difference between the Bible and a comic book, but God will devise a way for them to hear (here is His grace again!).
- Likewise (through grace yet again!), God will cause them to believe what they hear, to separate the true and right from all the false and wrong.
- Increasingly (in an instant or over time) they begin to see Jesus and realize He is The Hope and only Hope for them with any and all issues of life (Yep – by and through God’s grace).
In short, saving faith is always based on the truth found in the Bible! And saving faith is just the beginning (certainly not the end) of the saved life, of the Bible’s value and necessity – there are many important and on-going reasons and benefits in reading the Bible and reading it regularly.