I woke up worried. I heard some distressing news yesterday — and my heart remained troubled through the night. I pondered over the many sides to the story and wandered through the conflicting opinions on the solution. I knew I needed to pray. I knew it was my only option. But I wasn’t even sure how to do that.

“We need a prophet, God,” I said for about the hundredth time this year.

It’s the cry of my heart in the wilderness of our times. We don’t need a future foreteller, but a truth forth teller. Someone who will boldly speak God’s one truth into a fractured world. Someone who will humbly change his or her own ways and ideas when they don’t align with God’s. Someone who will courageously declare God’s Word, no matter who might get mad.

“We need a prophet,” I said again.

So I turned to one. I had a brand new Illuminated Scripture Journal of Isaiah I’d been wanting to mess up with my doodles and words.

Stuck in the preface

Before I got to the words of the prophet, God caught my attention with a heading in the publisher’s preface: THE BIBLE. As I read the paragraph, God spoke to my heart.

Christina Gayle, you are buffeted about by the many loud and convincing voices around you. You are concerned about which voice to believe, what leader to trust, and where to align your work.

And all the time, you hold in your hand a copy of my very words.

Oh, my daughter, listen to ME. MY words are your standard. Lay down your preconceptions, your loyalties, and your alignments. Pick up my Word. Hear my voice. Follow me.

Struck by the footnotes and parentheses

Noted. I hear you, Lord.

I started to flip the page and move on to Isaiah, but I was pulled back by the tiny little numbers at the end of each claim about the Word of God. The preface was good. But the footnotes were gold.

I’m a part of a weekly book discussion. Before our leader gets started on each week’s chapter, she reads aloud from God’s Word. Sometimes she reads several chapters of Scripture. Mostly what she reads are the verses referenced in the parentheses and footnotes of that day’s chapter. It’s all that stuff we tend to skim over when we read for speed.

The author of the book we’re discussing is our leader’s brother. She clearly respects and trusts his knowledge. She wouldn’t be reading his book or teaching through it if she didn’t think we could all learn from him.

But the author of the footnotes and parentheses is her Father. She doesn’t just learn from his words. His words make her wise.

The book is good. The footnotes are gold.

This morning, the good words in my journal’s preface caught my attention. But God’s words in the footnotes caught my heart and changed my mind.

The good words in my journal’s preface caught my attention.
But God’s words in the footnotes
caught my heart and changed my mind.

crg

If you’re like me, and in need of a word you can trust these days, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the verses from my journal’s footnotes. Read them in context. It’s good stuff. Here are a few of them:

“Every word of God proves true;
    he is a shield to those who take refuge in him” (Prov. 30:5).

The words of the Lord are pure words,
    like silver refined in a furnace on the ground,
    purified seven times” (Ps. 12:6).

“Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?” (Jer. 23:29). 

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb. 4:12).

“In the way of your testimonies I delight
    as much as in all riches.
I will meditate on your precepts
    and fix my eyes on your ways” (Ps. 119:14-15).

“But this is the one to whom I will look:
    he who is humble and contrite in spirit
    and trembles at my word” (Is. 66:2b).

“He (Moses) said to them, ‘Take to heart all the words by which I am warning you today, that you may command them to your children, that they may be careful to do all the words of this law. For it is no empty word for you, but your very life, and by this word you shall live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess’” (Deut. 32:46-47).

Why opt for an op-ed on current events when I can meditate on something eternal, true, pure, living, active, and piercing? Why not fix my eyes on the fire, hammer, and sword that delights me, humbles me, and causes me to tremble?

Come Alongside

So many voices. So much passion. I’m trying to listen. I’m trying to understand. But there is only one way for me to discern truth from lies and know the way to go. It’s to lay the word of man alongside the Word of God and weigh it.

I’m praying for us. I’m asking God to cut through the op-eds (even the ones we’ve written in our heads or heard at church) and show us His truth and His way. Will you pray alongside me?

And now that’s off my chest, so I’m going to start marking up that Isaiah journal.

Traveling in Grace,

Christi