Contemplative Bible Reading

John 5:39-40 (New Living Translation)

39 “You search the Scriptures because you think they give you eternal life. But the Scriptures point to me! 40 Yet you refuse to come to me to receive this life.

Jesus was chastising a crowd of people. In verse 39, He points to the shortcoming of the scriptures—they don’t give eternal life.

There are many things I could discuss now about the first sentence of verse 39. Allow me to mention just one small thing:

salvation is through Jesus Christ, nothing else.

The Bible—the words saved to us through history and, I believe, the divine intervention and direction of God—tells us of the Christ. I believe we should read it regularly and take it to heart. That shouldn’t be a surprise given I read it often and write a blog about bits and pieces of it.

Nevertheless, let’s not fall into worshiping the Bible. That is easy to do.