Why do you read your Bible? The reason is important. There might be times when we are not very enthusiastic to pick up God’s Word and read it, but that is not what I’m talking about. What I mean is that if you read the Bible but are not seeking to know God and please Him, you could be fooling yourself that God is pleased with you. There are instances throughout the Scriptures that point to people acting in ways that seem godly on the surface, but inwardly, they are far from God. In John 5, Jesus tells the Pharisees, “you search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.”
We need to be reminded that there is a difference between knowing God and knowing about God. In Psalm 27, David calls God “my light”, “my salvation”, and “the fortress of my life.” David is not talking about God in academic or theological terms but speaking out of a faith that knows God and has experienced Him personally in these capacities. We can see this because David responds to God’s command, “Seek my face,” by saying, “my heart says to you, your face, Lord, do I seek.” (vs.8) To seek God’s face is to genuinely submit my life to His in trust and love especially when times are difficult. To say that God is “light” means that I have been in the darkness and know that He is my only hope of seeing the direction I need to go and so in faith I walk that path. In saying He is my “salvation” is to experience the threat of being destroyed and seeing God being my only hope to rescue me and thus I trust and put my confidence in Him alone. In saying He is my “fortress” is to be under siege from various enemies and experiencing God’s protection as I flee to Him. David doesn’t just know facts about God; he knows God intimately.
It is easy to think that if we know a lot of the Bible or can quote it that we must be pleasing to God, but what God desires from us is a humble heart truly seeking to know Him. Without this kind of “knowing” and “seeking” of God, we have missed the entire point of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Paul states, “that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and may share His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead”. Let us not just make a check mark on our to-do list, but instead, let our hearts daily say as David’s did, “Your face, Lord, do I seek!”
VC Devotionals 