All Christians need to read the Bible. Sadly, the reality is that many Christians love the idea of the Bible but not really the Bible itself, says Marshall Segal, associate editor of the Christian ministry Desiring God.
"We love having a Bible close by, even within reach, but don't make time to open it on an average day. We talk about Bible reading like we talk about cutting calories or cleaning our house. We're grateful for the results, but we don't wake up dying to do it again," he writes on their website. "It sounds like a fine thing to do, until we have to choose what we won't do in order to make time for it."
However, Segal says this should not be the case because Bible reading is not a spiritual gift but a spiritual calling for all believers.
Segal suspects that many Christians are bored with the Bible because they have forgotten its importance. He himself is guilty of feeling that way, because more often than not, he is more excited to read the new bestseller rather than the Bible. Segal also spends more time thinking of the conversations happening on Twitter than the ones written in the Bible.
Segal quotes Pastor John Piper on the importance of Bible reading: "Stand in awe of this. The God who keeps watch over the nations, like some people keep watch over cattle or stock markets or construction sites — this God still speaks in the twenty-first century.
"By this voice, He speaks with absolute truth and personal force. By this voice, He reveals his all-surpassing beauty. By this voice, He reveals the deepest secrets of our hearts. No voice anywhere anytime can reach as deep or lift as high or carry as far as the voice of God that we hear in the Bible."
