The Book's Burial

It was not lost on me that I was laying to rest my old Bible, the written Word of God, on Good Friday, the same day the Living Word of God was killed and placed in an empty tomb.

Oh, how I hated to part with it! A new edition of the Living Translation Bible, simply called The Book, it presented the truths of the scriptures in easier-to-read language than the King James Version I’d been struggling with earlier. Suddenly my study times became an exciting adventure as I could better understand the stories in the Old Testament and the instructions on how to live today in the New. I simply devoured it.

And it showed. The cover was now battered and torn, the binding broken so that the pages fell out in sections and individually, the treasures highlighted and underlined on them likely to be scattered and lost if not for the elastic band I kept around the volume to hold it all together.

The Book held my life together in those early days of growing spiritually, when my daylight hours were filled with meeting the needs of my growing family until I fell into my bed exhausted at night. It helped me see how the truths of the past could help me in my life today, and it’s only because it presented the words I needed to hear in such a readable format that I bothered to pick it up at all. But I did, and it fed me, bite after bite, until eventually my morning meeting with God in those pages became the most important meal of the day. I was simply so hungry for what God had to say.

I’ve had several Bibles come into my life since then, different translations of the original text and different formats in printing, some with commentaries or small devotions included in appropriate spots in the text, one even with pertinent pictures to color as you read along and special space in the margins to make your own notes. Each has had a special place in my spiritual growth and thus in my heart. Every January I pick a different one to study from in the coming days of that year.

That’s how I came to hold The Book in my hands again this past New Year’s Day. Except that I soon found I couldn’t keep it in my hands this year – the broken binding had the pages spilling everywhere and the effort of holding it together rendered its purpose of holding my life together less effective. I finally realized that the words on those pages had long since been written in my heart and would be kept safe there by the Spirit of God, never to depart. I could let The Book go.

The same day I came to that decision I ordered myself a new Bible to take its place. The Book itself is no longer in print, so I chose a translation new to me, to add to my collection and read through the rest of the year. It arrived a few days ago, but I haven’t opened the box yet. I’m saving that moment for tomorrow’s Easter morning, when I hope to see Jesus come alive in new and unexpected ways, even as His resurrection from the grave brought new life and hope and joy to all mankind. I pray that as I flip through those pages I’ll hear the Spirit within me likewise say, “He is risen! He is risen indeed!”

Amen and amen.

“So they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, saying, ‘The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!’” 

(Luke 24:34 NKJV)