The Neglected Treasure
She lived in poverty out in the
Scottish highlands, the story goes. Her son had gone to America and
gotten very rich, so they said. Neighbours wondered why she was so
impoverished if her son was so rich. Does he not send you money? they
wanted to know. She said he sent her pretty pictures. She took down the
family Bible and scattered throughout it were scores of ten, fifty and
hundred dollar bills. Her Bible was full of treasure and this isolated
and elderly lady didn't recognise the foreign money. Hard to believe?
Maybe. Multiplied millions in the world don't know the treasure they
have in their Bibles. For a thousand reasons people ignore it and their
lives are narrower because of it. The Bible's not an ordinary book and
you can be infinitely richer if you'll allow it to tell you its message.
Can There Really Be Treasure?
How's it possible that an ancient book can matter that much to modern
men? What does it have that makes it the most influential book in the
world? (Even the Islamic world reveres large portions of the Bible!) How
do you explain the fact that down through the ages those who sought to
enslave others have burned Bibles and outlawed the reading of it? Why
did these governments go to the trouble to suppress the Scriptures? Why
do countless thousands in every age ask for it to be read at their
marriages and at their funerals?
The Power & Beauty of the Bible
Robert Evans met an old man in bombed-out Warsaw at the close of
World War II, who, all his life had owned and cherished one page of the
Bible . He wasn't sure it was from the Bible. "I have read this page
again and again all my life," he told Evans. "I thought it was from the
Bible, but I was never sure. There's something different about it--this I
know. But I've always wondered what comes on the next page." And he
wept as Evans let him handle, for the first time in his life, an entire
Bible, page by page. How do you explain all this? The Bible is precious
and down the centuries has gained a wonderful and an ennobling power
over wistful hearts.
Of course the Bible has its occasional critics. (Can you remember any
of their names?) But when you easily dismiss something as acclaimed as
Shakespeare's plays, you're saying more about yourself than Shakespeare.
Those who tell us they regard Beethoven or Mozart as rubbish don't
impress us as qualified critics.
But maybe the Bible gets more criticism because of its "friends" than
its critics. They say they think it's precious but aren't nearly as
thrilled about it as students of Shakespeare, Homer or Dostoievski are
about those authors. They say they revere it but live as though it means
nothing to them. They say it's deeply satisfying but spend no time
delving into it. Thoughtful unbelievers note all this and wonder.
None of this is the fault of the Bible. It can't be right to dismiss
Dvorak or Bach as trivial because some musician we know butchers their
work. We can't be doing right to dismiss the work of Shakespeare or
Goethe because some actor makes an awful mess of their material. And it
can't be right to dismiss the Bible because its friends represent it
pathetically.
It's to the Bible's everlasting credit that despite its critics and
its "friends" it remains the foremost book in all the world, generation
after generation. Others feel the need to protect their holy book from
criticism so they forbid even the translation of it. Enlightened
Bible-believers have no such fears. The Bible, somebody said, is like an
anvil and its critics are like hammers. The hammers wear out while the
anvil remains. As long as there are people in darkness who need light,
people in suffering who need comfort, people in despair who need hope,
people who are lost and need to be found, people in bondage who need to
be freed--as long as such people exist the Bible will be around and in
demand!
The Nature of the Bible's Treasure
The Bible is glorious literature. It's right to say the Bible
is glorious literature! It's right to remind people that all the noted
writers from the earliest ages until now confess their debt to the
Bible. Shakespeare, Hugo, Tolstoy, Dickens, Cervantes, Tennyson,
Browning, Goethe and a host of others openly confessed their debt to the
Bible. The themes with which they dealt, the themes that made their
works live on and on, they had in common with the Bible. That's all true
and it's right to say it--but it isn't enough to say that! The Bible is
more than inspiring and glorious literature. It isn't Shakespeare or
Sienkiewicz people want to hear as they lie on or sit by death-beds
speechless with grief. In their multiplied millions they ask for the
Holy Bible. Why is that?
The Bible promotes and defends all that mankind in its better moments
cherishes and calls for. Imagine how the world would be transformed if
it wakened one morning with the Bible supreme in everyone's life!
Imagine how the world would be if everyone joyously believed Psalm 23 or
John 3:16-17 or took Matt 7:12 and 22:36-40 to heart!
Imagine the opposite to be true! Suppose the world wakened one
morning to the sure and certain knowledge that the Bible was a tissue of
lies and errors! Worship would die--immediately! Prayer would be
universally abandoned, it would be heard never again on the lips of
children or in the hush of great sorrows. Hope would be snuffed out of
life and the witness of multiplied millions of God-fearing people
against oppression and evil would be silenced. Their restraining power
against vice would crumble into ruins and the bereaved would weep tears
without comfort. When the last Bible was thrown out with the rubbish,
the last hymn would be sung, the last missionary would be recalled and
the last sermon of comfort and challenge would be preached. The world
would have died and the church buildings would have become tombstones
marking out God's grave! The glory and power of the Bible could only be
fully appreciated if we saw the horror of a world convinced it was lies
and fallacies. But the Bible's treasure is richer even than this!
The Bible is and brings us the true word from God that he wants to
live in loving fellowship with all mankind! There's the crowning message
of the Bible! That's what makes the heart surge!
The Bible confronts our sad and narrow little lives with the picture
of our startling possibilities! For our own eternal benefit it exposes
our awful sinfulness and our profound need of God who will save us and
bless us with life! It tells the amazing story of a God who bears his
own judgement against Sin that he might offer eternal friendship to Man.
It speaks of a God who shares our suffering until that day when
suffering will end. It gives meaning to our living and glorious hope
when we are dying!
It calls us to join with Jesus Christ in the most fantastic of all
adventures, the rescue of the world. It shows us how to live with our
weaknesses without being proud of them, how to fail without being
crushed beyond repair, how to trust in spite of appearances. It brings
us God's approval when we act nobly and God's forgiveness when we try
and fail. It won't allow us to fritter away our lives with trivia. It
calls us from a thousand scattered little loyalties to one grand "I
must!". Getting to know it will profoundly change our lives!