Read the instructions!

How many of you out there read instructions? Whether its a new toaster, a new tool, or something the kids got for Christmas, how many of us actually read the instructions instead of just scanning them, or tossing the instruction sheet aside? Let's be honest here...show of hands.

Okay, I have to be honest, I don't read the instructions until I have to. When I get to the point that I'm stuck, or a part doesn't fit, then I read the instructions. A tool or appliance? When I need to troubleshoot or in the case of my new microwave, I actually did read the instructions, and they helped, but I still had to go back because I kind of only scanned the last part of the booklet, and I got stuck as to how to get it to do something.

Most of the time, I'm golden. I can put something together using common sense, or I can use a tool or appliance that I just got because I've used one before and know how to use it safely. I'll toss aside instructions that make no sense and try to figure it out on my own. for example, my knitting machine...still haven't figured it out, with or without the instructions. Its like a robot translated the instructions literally, and they make no sense at all.

In our lives we tend to do that, too. And believe it or not, there are a set of instructions on how to live your life. Yup, it's the Bible. Now, before you go off and say that what it contains are archaic instructions, I have to ask you...have you read it? I mean really read it? Yes, the laws contained in the Mosaic Law are...different. They were intended for the Children of Israel, to help them gain a moral structure and really, in my opinion, showed them how impossible it was to gain perfection. Now, also contained in the Old Testament is the Moral Law, we know them as the Ten Commandments. The first part of the Ten Commandments shows how we should be God-ward, the second part, us (and neighbor)-ward. These Laws never change because they are basic instructions for how to live life peaceably with each other and God. In the New Testament, Jesus says that He came to fulfill the Law, not to destroy it (Mt 5:7), and He did. Every law that was created apart from the Ten Commandments, He came and sacrificed Himself, a perfect, living Sacrifice, so that we could be made perfect. As for the Ten Commandments, He said this:

Mt 22: 34-40

34 But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”

37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

What Jesus did was to summarize the Ten Commandments in one neat bundle. 

Does that mean we aren't to read the Bible, especially the Old Testament? Absolutely you should! The Bible is a treasure trove, waiting to be explored and devoured. It contains passages that tell you that the folks who are written about in its pages have been there, done that! Liars, thieves, murderers, alternative life style leaners (yeah, it's in there, read the story of Lot), adulterers, betrayers, prostitutes, braggarts, they're all in there, and God used every one of them to show how He can use you...how, in some cases, they were redeemed, and in others, how their hard hearts kept them from their full lives and eternal life with Him. 

Folks, there's nothing in life that wasn't addressed. When we just scan the pages, or read only a chapter or book or two, then we cheat ourselves. When we don't read the Instruction Book that we've been given, our lives have a tendency to not work right, or we are confused as to how to make it work. I'm not saying that if you read it from cover to cover, including the maps that your life will be magically transformed to that of no issues...even with the things in our lives that we purchase and put together, having read the instructions, sometimes go awry. But, the Instructions (the Bible) helps us to understand why something went wrong...helps us to trust that the Manufacturer made a quality product (you), and that sometimes life throws us a whammy that we have to get through...through prayer and faith. 

Christ never told His followers that once they were saved that they would have a garden path in life from there on out. No, in fact, He warned them that life would get more complex, that Evil would rise up against them. But, He also told His followers that if they were steadfast and true, that at the end of their lives, they would enter Eternity where there was no more sorrow, no more tears, no more pain. That all things would be made new. The Alpha and Omega promised that, and it's in black and white, folks (Rev. 21). 

So, I encourage you, read your Instruction Manual (your Bible). Ask God to open your eyes to what He is showing you, and open your understanding so that you may follow the instructions He gave you. Yes, they're written by man's hand, but they were Inspired by the Heart and Mind of the Father that loves you more than you could ever imagine. 

Be blessed, my friends.

~L