But my mouth would encourage you; comfort from my lips would bring you relief.
Job 16:5 (NIV)
| To Know Again by Cathy Vinson |
When I first met my husband, he shared with me his love of reading. As the years have passed, his library of books has greatly accumulated. Reading has just become being taken for granted as a way of life. But what is reading..words written on a page? letters of the alphabet that we have come to recognize? What is reading, and what is it meant to be and do? The desire to even strip down this most common act to its basics came by just seeing the original meaning the word "reading" has derived from. Reading (anaginosko; ana-again, ginosko-to know) means to know again, recognize, to know certainly. So reading comes from the concept of knowing again. Take, for example, Chuck Swindoll in his study. He experiences a truth helpful to himself and others, and in order for it to be known again, he writes it down. As we come along at a later date and read a book of his, we recognize the letters he penned that formed words that formed ideas that now form experiences...hence the revelation he had known earlier can be known by us, and experienced. It is known again, and reading has reached its potential. Isn't this the highest calling of reading? Isn't this what the reading of Scripture is all about? We can know today experientially, we can know intimately (as Adam "knew" Eve experientially) what was known at an earlier date and time when the writer of a Scripture was under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and we can be changed! This being the intent, what awesome possibilities are in reading! To take this consideration of the basics of "reading" one step further, we, too, are called "an epistle...known and read (anaginosko) of all men" (2 Cor 3:2). How do books vs humans such as ourselves connect together? Rather than an alphabet, WE ourselves are the "alphabet" that provide recognizable letters and symbols through our lives that can be acknowledged by the world of onlookers. They are "knowing and experiencing again" the Gospel message that has been preached to them. They see this through the testimony of change that has first happened within our hearts (3:3). We become the message read to the world. When Jesus above asked the same Pharisees who sought to tempt Him (Mt 19:4) if they had "read," He was asking a question of relationship as they had poured over and sought to apprehend the Holy Scriptures. Let us take the admonition to heart and value reading as being the open gate of opportunity to the experience of many before us who have entrusted through their writing down: to us another knowing again. |
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"Haven't you read...?" (Matthew 19:4) |
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Other Whispers from the Wilderness Devotions are found HERE
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