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Feeding on God's Word
By David Feddes

God's Word is amazing. When we think about the Bible and God's written Word, it's food when we're hungry. Jesus said, "Man doesn't live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4). So the Bible is like bread that nourishes. It's like sweet honey—sweeter than honey from the comb, according to the Scriptures (Psalm 19:10).

When we're in the dark, the Bible is our light. "Your word is a lamp to my feet, a light unto my path" (Psalm 119:105). When we're in danger or when we've gotten too sleepy and need to be awakened, God's Word is our alarm. The Bible says, "Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you" (Ephesians 5:14). "The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed" (Romans 13:11). And there are many alarms in the Bible of waking up and getting ready and fighting the devil and living for the Lord.

Speaking of fighting, when you're in danger and opposition comes against you, the Bible is your weapon. "Take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" (Ephesians 6:17). The Bible's also our foundation. Scripture speaks of "the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone" (Ephesians 2:20). The Bible witnesses to Christ, and it does so through the writings of the prophets and the apostles. Jesus himself said that "everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock" (Matthew 7:24). The words of Jesus and the rest of the Scriptures are the foundation of rock that stands firm in any storm.

So the Bible is our food, our light, our alarm, our weapon, our foundation, and so much more. And that means, of course, that we need the Bible and we need to learn how to take it in and benefit from it so it can do all those things for us. And in feeding on God's Word, let's focus on six main ways to do that: read, memorize, meditate, listen, apply, and write.

The Bible is a book, and so we should read. Nobody is exempt from this need. No matter how smart or important you are, Scripture says the king is to read it all the days of his life. He's not to think he's better than others, but he's to read this Word so that he gets God's promises and he's directed by God's commands (Deuteronomy 17:18–20).

Sometimes when the spiritual life of Israel was very low, things revived again when a king got back on track. For instance, with King Josiah, they were cleaning up God's temple and nobody had been reading God's Word for a long time, and they found an old scroll of the Scriptures. And when the king heard it read to him, he was astonished. At first he was terrified and horrified at how far the nation had strayed. But then he was comforted and directed to undertake a great reform (2 Kings 22–23). Reading the Bible made him a great king and a revival leader.

Jesus would often say to those who were talking with him, "Have you not read? Have you not read? Have you not read?" (e.g., Matthew 12:3, 12:5, 19:4, 22:31). And so he just assumed that people ought to be reading God's written Word. And if they would, they would understand him, the Lord Jesus, better because Jesus said, "These are the Scriptures that testify about me" (John 5:39).

Now, when it comes to reading, we should read in private as well as as a family. So take time every day for yourself to read a portion of the Scripture by yourself and for your own benefit. And if you're blessed with a spouse or children, then as a family, spend Bible time together as a family. Make it a special daily time, a scheduled time, so that you don't just kind of go hit-and-miss and whatever you feel like. If you have it scheduled, sometimes there will be a day when the schedule is too messed up and you just don't get it done, or when the schedule's messed up but you still pick a time that day to get it done. Because if you schedule, then you do it most of the time.

For many people, this works around meal time to do it as a family. Whether you have breakfast together or the evening meal together, that's a great time to have your daily Bible time as a family. As an individual, you need to know what works best for you. For many, just right when you get up in the morning is your best time to spend some time with the Lord to read the Scriptures on your own and follow a reading plan. Don't just flop it open and read whatever appears to you.

Overall, if you're a Christian leader especially, it's good to read through the Bible on a fairly regular basis, to read through the Bible every year or two. And you need to follow a structured—there's many good reading plans that will help you do that. You say, "Man, that would take tons of time." Here's a fact: if you were to listen to the Bible on recording—and that's another way to read it; you don't just have to read it yourself. For some people it works to listen to the Bible read to you while you're driving in a car from here to there. Maybe that's a good reading time for you as an individual. But anyway, 72 hours of recording will get you the whole Bible. Many people watch that many hours of TV in less than a month.

Okay, so if you say, "Oh, that would take so much time to read through the whole Bible." No, it would take 72 hours. Seventy-two hours would be 3 days non-stop without sleeping. There's 365 days in a year. So it's doable. So follow a reading plan and read. Read and never give up on reading the Bible in private and with your family, if you have one.

Then memorize the Bible. Scripture says, "I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you" (Psalm 119:11). One defense against sin is just to store up more and more of God's Word in you. "I will not forget your word" (Psalm 119:16). So memorize. Commit to memory so that you know word for word certain verses.

Here's some tips on how to get going with Bible memory. First of all, you might just choose verses that you need most, certain truths that you need to get into your head. Like, "Oh, Jesus is divine." So you learn John 1:1, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1:1). And John 1:14, "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us" (John 1:14). So you know the truth that Jesus is God and he's God become flesh, and you memorize that.

Or you memorize, "God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16), the great truth of salvation.

You learn praises to the Lord. "I will praise you, O Lord" (Psalm 9:1). There are all kinds of psalms. "The Lord is my shepherd" (Psalm 23:1). "Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth" (Psalm 100:1). "Worship the Lord with gladness" (Psalm 100:2). "O Lord my God, you are very great" (Psalm 104:1). "Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise; his greatness no one can fathom" (Psalm 145:3).

You learn verses of praise: "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 1:3). You learn the promises of Scripture: "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you" (Hebrews 13:5). And you memorize that and you get it into your head and into your heart.

Verses of guidance: you learn the Ten Commandments by heart (Exodus 20:1–17; Deuteronomy 5:6–21). You learn Jesus’ great commands: love God above all and your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:37–39). You memorize these things. And so as you take verses that you need or that are just important for every Christian to know, commit them to memory and they become a part of you.

How do you do that? Well, find frequent time slots. For me, here's just a few examples—they may not sound very spiritual to you. One good time for me to memorize is when I'm brushing my teeth in the morning and at night. I just have the current passage that I'm working on right there, and I look at it while I'm brushing my teeth or while I'm walking around. And it just helps me memorize. I think about my Bible verse. I do that while I'm brushing my teeth, and then I'm still thinking about it when I go to bed. And I'm thinking about it even as I go to sleep, and it helps me to memorize it.

I have Bible memory with me when I'm on my exercise bike or when I go outside jogging and exercising. There, I'll go over a few verses and then keep going over them in my mind as I go running. Or I'll review passages that I've memorized before while I'm doing exercise. For many people who commute or drive quite a bit, spending time in your car is a good time to have Bible passages that you're going through in your mind for Bible memory.

So keep your verses nearby. Have them. If you've got a smartphone, you can have copies of them on your smartphone, and then you can glance at them and go over them in your head while you're doing something else. Or have them printed out on a piece of paper and just have them handy so that if you're waiting in line somewhere, got nothing better to do, whip out your Bible memory, and you can commit portions of God's Word to mind. And then review regularly. Because things that you memorize this week and say, "Wow, I'm so glad I memorized that. That's such a meaningful verse. I'll never forget it." Well, you probably will.

You may not forget all of its impact and its general statement, but if you learn especially a Bible passage or a whole chapter of the Bible, you need to review it or your memory just starts to fade on what the actual wording is. So review it regularly. And not just then to review, but also then it's there for you to meditate on and to really think about once you've committed it to memory.

So choose verses. Find the time slots that'll work for you—whether you're brushing your teeth, exercising, driving, waiting in line, whatever those might be. Have verses nearby. Review regularly your Bible memory, and it'll add up. Hundreds, even thousands of verses can add up over time. But it starts with one or two. If you've never memorized, just start somewhere. Do something and then build from there.

And along with memorization, then you meditate. You keep thinking about God's Word. As the Scripture puts it, "On the glorious splendor of your majesty and on your wondrous works I will meditate" (Psalm 145:5). You're focusing on how wonderful God is and on the amazing things that God does, and you keep thinking about those things.

Meditation is to dwell on—just keep thinking about over and over and running it through your mind. In a sense, it's the positive version of worry. You know how with worry, you just keep going over and over and over in your mind the thing that's bugging you or the thing you're afraid of. Well, meditation is going over and over and over in your mind God and his wonders and his love. And healthy meditation ponders the Lord and his works and ponders your ways.

Let's look at what the Bible says about that. "Within your temple, O God, we meditate on your unfailing love" (Psalm 48:9). God is love (1 John 4:8). And so meditate on his steadfast love. Meditate on his faithfulness. "On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night" (Psalm 63:6). When you're lying in bed, just ready to go to sleep, think about God and how good he's been to you. Sometimes you may have a night where it's not so easy to sleep. Then turn your thoughts to God and ponder how great he is—his love, his mercy, his faithfulness, his wisdom, his power, his righteousness, his judgments.

And when you're thinking of God, of course the best focus for God is Jesus himself, who brings God into perfect human flesh and human focus. So, "Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith" (Hebrews 12:2). Meditation is simply on the being of God and his attributes and the things that are true of him and his character.

And then also ponder God's works—the things that he does. "I will ponder all your work and meditate on your mighty deeds" (Psalm 77:12). "Great are the works of the Lord; they are pondered by all who delight in them" (Psalm 111:2). "I meditate on all your works and consider what your hands have done" (Psalm 143:5). So you think of things God does.

Start with creation. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis 1:1). And think of what an amazing thing it was for him to bring the worlds into being out of nothing, to create the heavens and the angels as well as the earth and all its creatures.

Psalm 104 is a psalm that's 35 verses long, and it goes through the different things God has created. God created the earth. He created the waters. He covered the earth with the waters. Then he made the waters flow down into the ravines and the valleys and made the dry land. He puts birds in the trees. He has the wild donkeys. He has the cattle that he provides grass for. He gives plants for man to cultivate and satisfies his heart and gives him wine and bread and oil and all sorts of good things. He takes care of the sea creatures. He creates the darkness, and the lions go out and search for their prey from God, and man goes out to his work. And the Bible speaks of all these different aspects of creation.

And then it says, "May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the Lord" (Psalm 104:34). So he's meditating on creation, on the works of creation and the things God continues to do—not just way back when he made the world, but the way he runs his creation, and tends it, and satisfies the needs of people now, and the needs of his animals and the needs of the plants.

And you think not then just about God as the creator and the things he does there, but God as the one who rules history. And you read the Bible stories of the kings whom God raised up and brought down, or the judges that he governed, or the nations that he raised up or brought down. And you think of God as this great ruler and King of kings of history (Daniel 2:21; Revelation 19:16).

You think of God as the Savior and his works of salvation—bringing the people of Israel out of Egypt, rescuing them from slavery and bringing them into the promised land (Exodus 14). Or God rescuing his people from exile and bringing them back to their homeland again (Ezra 1–2). Or above all, the great Lord Jesus Christ coming and doing his miracles. Think about Jesus' miracles, his teaching, his suffering, his death, his tremendous compassion and love, his glorious resurrection, the fact that he's seated at the right hand of God and ruling (Luke 24:50–51; Acts 2:32–33; Hebrews 1:3). Fill your minds with these things and ponder God and ponder his works.

And then as you ponder God's being and God's works, also ponder your ways in the light of the Bible. Here's a few Bible verses to help us with that: "In your anger do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent" (Psalm 4:4). So sometimes when you're angry, what you need to do is don't blow up. Just think. And if you go to bed angry, just ponder in your own hearts and be silent. Think: what made me so angry? What's going on in my life? Is there an evil that somebody else is doing that needs to be resisted? Is there something just wrong with me and I shouldn't have gotten angry? But you ponder, and you ponder your ways.

Or in Haggai: "Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: Give careful thought to your ways" (Haggai 1:5). You've sown much and harvested little. Things aren't going well for you financially. Ponder. You think about that. And once you think about it, then God tells them why it is. Well, you're building your own fancy houses, and you're not building my temple and worried about worshiping me. So you ponder your ways, and you learn to do better.

Or Romans 12:3, "Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you" (Romans 12:3). There it's talking about the measure of faith that you have, so you don't overestimate how far you've gone in the Christian life. And think of yourself in terms of the talents you have and the opportunities God gives you. You have sober judgment. And you have to ponder. You have to meditate: God, how have you made me? What talents do I have? What do you want me to do with them?

And all of that's part of pondering your ways. You're pondering your emotions—maybe your anger or something else. You're pondering what's happening in your life. You're pondering maybe when things have gone wrong for you. And you're saying, "God, why is that?" You're saying, "God, how did you make me, and what are your purposes for me?" You're pondering your ways.

And as you meditate on the Bible, then the Holy Spirit will show application to life events. So you may be thinking about a Bible passage, but then something about your life comes to mind. And as that happens, the Lord Jesus Christ is entering more deeply into your life.

Other times, your meditation may be on your life events, and you're thinking about it and wondering what's going on. And the Holy Spirit brings some Bible truths to mind and applies those to the situation you've just been thinking about. And so there you are, entering into Christ's life. The Bible speaks of Christ in you and you in Christ (John 15:4; Colossians 1:27). And meditation helps to advance that process where you're meditating on the Bible and Christ is coming more and more into you, and you're meditating on your life and how the Bible relates to it, and then you're entering more and more into Christ.

And as you're meditating, the Holy Spirit of Jesus is showing your spirit which of your thoughts and emotions are from Christ. We have many different kinds of emotions, many different kinds of thoughts. And some of them may come from bad digestion or just from something that hasn't gone our way and we're thinking about it, but it's no great truth. Others may be suggestions that come from the evil one (John 8:44; 2 Corinthians 11:3). But many of our thoughts and emotions may be coming from Christ, and he wants us to recognize that as his peace or his love coming to us or his truth coming to us. And we're sorting that out because you think about the jumble of thoughts and you meditate—you say, "Yeah, that's from God," and, "No, that's not." And so you meditate and you reject certain kinds of thoughts and ideas that have been rattling around in your head, and you recognize others as, "Hey, that's the Spirit really speaking to me." And the Bible helps you with that as you meditate on the Bible in the presence of Christ and of his Spirit.

So feeding on God's Word involves the fact that you need to read and memorize and meditate. And don't neglect these. Don't just think you can read the Bible, slam it shut, and move on. Memorization helps to lodge it in your heart. Meditation helps it to become so real to you and apply it to your life and draw you into closer and closer connection with God.

One of the old Puritan writers said that one reason we come away from the Scripture cold is that we do not warm ourselves at the fire of meditation. We just read it and put it down again. But meditation helps those fires to grow hotter and hotter.

Another aspect of feeding on God's Word is to listen. An example of that is in the book of Nehemiah, where it says Ezra the priest read the scroll aloud, and the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law. The Levites who were assisting Ezra read from the Book of the Law of God, making it clear and giving the meaning so that the people understood what was being read (Nehemiah 8:1–8). So there's a time to read on your own, but there's also a great time to hear the public reading of God's Word and the public explanation by people who have been trained in that. In other words, to listen to the preaching of the Word, the preaching of the gospel, and the preaching of biblical truth when God's people gather for worship.

You can also listen to God's Word when you hear proclaimers—not necessarily in a church—but you may be hearing some excellent proclaimers that you found on the internet, great teachers of the Word, and they help you when you listen to them. The Bible says, "Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ" (Romans 10:17). Another place to listen is in Bible study groups where you talk with each other and where people who have been studying the Word together share the insights, sometimes correct each other's mistakes. If one saw something in a passage that was not really a correct reading, maybe the others in the group can kind of help them modify their understanding.

So listening—listening to the Word proclaimed—is so important. Don't think you can neglect church. You need to hear the proclamation of the Word as part of your growth in the Lord.

And then apply. You apply the Word of God in many ways, but here's just a beginning. Ask the Holy Spirit, "Lord, how is your grace touching me in this?" Some passages are revealing God's promises, his mercy, his grace, his forgiveness. And when you're reading passages like that, you say, "Lord, how are you touching me? Show me how you're loving me and taking away my sins and renewing me" (Titus 3:4–7; 1 John 1:9).

Other passages are mainly teaching passages, and they're meant to give you a correct understanding and proper doctrine. And so you say, "Lord, what truth do you want me to discover? What do you want me to believe more clearly and more firmly than I've been believing it?" And so you want to clarify and strengthen your grasp on truth (2 Timothy 3:16–17).

At other times, you're reading passages that really challenge you. And they may be passages about being generous or giving (2 Corinthians 9:6–8), or there may be passages about loving others (1 John 4:7) or about forsaking your sins (Proverbs 28:13) or whatever that might be. But you're reading certain passages, and they hit you between the eyes, and you really got to take that to heart. And you say, "Lord, what attitudes of mine are you correcting?" And then, "What action steps should I take? What new actions should I be doing so that I'm not just a hearer of the Word but a doer as well?" (James 1:22).

So be listening to the Word for God's grace, for his doctrinal truth, for challenge and correction, and building up of proper attitudes and emotions, and for direction in the steps you take. And make sure that you don't go away from Bible reading without knowing what God wants you to do in applying it. As the Holy Spirit applies the Word to your heart, take action with the Spirit's help and in the Spirit's power, because that's what the Word is ultimately meant for—to be lived, to be experienced, to be acted upon.

Feeding on God's Word: read, memorize, meditate, listen, apply. And then a final thing I want to mention is write. Because many people find it helpful to write down what they're learning or write down what they're struggling with and pondering and trying to make their way through.

The Bible itself has examples of people who wrote or—you might almost say—kept a journal. Most of the book of Job is a journal of conversation between Job and his friends. And it's a journal of inner struggles that Job has. And it also records a direct encounter that he had with God, and it has tremendous value in that (Job 3–42).

Many psalms are filled with expressions of feeling and thoughts and prayers that God's people have written down. And they're the Word of God—they're in the Bible. But we need to realize too that they are the words of people who had feelings and thoughts and were offering these prayers to God, and they're an example of what we can do when we write down prayers or when we write down what we're feeling or what we're struggling with or what we're thinking about God. Writing it down often helps us to sort it out (see Psalms 6, 13, 42, 73, etc.).

The book of Ecclesiastes is kind of a journal of midlife crisis, of somebody who's rich, who's got it all, who's got power, and comes up empty. And so he sorts through the various aspects of life and finally finds his way through again to the fact that life is all about putting God first, fearing God, keeping his commandments—that's what it means to be human (Ecclesiastes 12:13). But it's a journal of somebody who's in the midst of a struggle.

Jeremiah, Habakkuk, other prophets of the Bible—you read them and you see that they wrote down questions they had, personal struggles they had, sometimes things that they were angry with God about or questions they had for God, and they wrote it down (Jeremiah 20:7–9; Habakkuk 1:2–4). And when you keep a journal, you can do similar things where you put into words—and then write them down on paper—what it is that's either troubling you or that you're discovering or that you're excited about.

When you read the epistles, the apostle Paul and other writers often share their personal thoughts and experiences in the course of communicating God's truth (e.g., 2 Corinthians 1:8–10; Philippians 1:12–14). So writing what's on your heart has a lot of precedent and examples in the Bible itself.

And what's the value of it for us? Well, for one thing—remembering rather than forgetting. If you're like me, you've got a really good forgetter. Something that really struck you and impressed you—three weeks later you're thinking, "What was that again?" Or it drops completely out of your memory. But when you write it down in a journal, then insights you had are there for you to look at again later and say, "Oh yeah, and that's right." And it helps you all over again.

Sometimes you just have impressions or insights that you think might be from God or that you think might be valuable. You're not quite sure, but just write it down. Look at it again a little later. And by then you've got a little more distance from that impression or that insight, and you say, "I think that was from God, and that's something I've got to explore further." Or you say, "Nah, that really wasn't." And it really wasn't anything much. But when you write it down—just writing it down in the first place—putting it into words clarifies, and then looking at it later can really help you identify and sort out what was valuable.

Writing helps you to get realistic and know yourself. When you keep a journal and you see some of the same problems or challenges come up again, you say, "I'm in a rut on that. I need to deal with that. That's a problem in my life." If you write down in your journal and then later on see that you've written a number of times, "I blew up at the kids again," or "I was really cross with my wife," or "I just didn't resist that sin today," and you see that and kind of keep a record, then you know yourself better than if you just—oh, stuff just kind of happens by the seat of your pants and then you forget about it, and you do it all over again, but you're never tracking it.

And so it's also helpful then in setting goals for yourself and evaluating your progress in those goals. You write down, "Here's some things that I want to do." And instead of just having a few New Year's resolutions that you forget about soon, you have a journal, and then you check back in with yourself from time to time and say, "How am I doing on those goals? Am I progressing?"

And when you write down what God's showing you or things that happened in your life where you say, "Boy, that was a blessing from God. Man, did God help me out there," and you write that down, then later on you've got a record of what God's been doing for you. And you can thank him all over again and see his hand at work in your life.

You can see how God answers your prayers when you journal some of your prayers. Some of the things you've asked God for or people that you've been praying about—you see, "God, I'm amazed that you answered that. I can see the prayers that you took and answered." And others, you might say, "Well, God, why didn't you answer that? I'm going to keep praying for it." But your prayer life is something you can track a little better.

And writing supports your other spiritual disciplines because you say, "Well, I want to fast a day a week," and you keep a journal and—oops—I didn't do it that week. Well, next week I do want to do that. Or you keep track—"Hey, I read the Bible, and this is the passage I read today. Now here's what I read the next day, and then here's what I read the next day." Especially if you're getting started in certain spiritual disciplines, writing can help you. You don't always have to keep track of everything you're doing, but it helps you when you're trying to get into a healthy habit.

Much as keeping a food journal will help somebody who's trying to control their diet and eat healthy—they'll keep a food journal for a while just to track what they're eating, everything they eat. And then after a while they don't need that journal quite as much because they've gotten into a better habit. Or somebody who's got financial problems writes down everything you've been spending, and you track your spending for a while. And once you get it under control and have a better sense of where the money's going and how to manage it, you might not have to write nearly as much.

But it helps you when you're getting started in your spiritual disciplines, in your financial disciplines, in your health disciplines—in various aspects of life. So it can be very helpful for many people to write as part of your spiritual growth and your Bible intake.

Here's a question: are you feeding on God's Word, or are you focusing more on other voices? And those other voices are out there. What are the most valuable companies in the world right now as I'm speaking? Well, most of them are involved with the internet and electronic devices—Apple Corporation, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Microsoft. Those are the five most valuable corporations in the world right now as I'm talking to you. And what do they all have in common? They all have in common the ability to get your attention and hold it by using the internet and electronic devices.

That's a nice thing to have in some senses. I like my smartphone. I like to be able to be connected. But the challenge of staying focused when there's so many other things—of social media and so on—to occupy my attention and my time.

Are you feeding on God's Word, or are you focusing more on other voices? Answer that question honestly. The Bible is food, but food benefits you only if you eat it, not if you just leave it lying there (Matthew 4:4; Jeremiah 15:16). The Bible is light, but if you never turn it on or shine it on your path, what good does it do you? (Psalm 119:105). The Bible is an alarm, but when it sounds the alarm, you’ve got to get up and get going. You’ve got to take action (Romans 13:11; Ephesians 5:14). The Bible is a weapon, but what good is a sword in its sheath or a gun in its holster? It’s got to be used and be ready at hand in order to be a weapon (Ephesians 6:17). And that means you’ve got to be reading it and know how to use it. The Bible is a foundation, but if you’re not building on it, then your life is built on sand, says the Lord Jesus (Matthew 7:24–27).

So the Bible is all these things. But for it to be of value to you, it has to be used. The food must be eaten. The light must be shined. The alarm must be sounded and heeded. The weapon must be used. The foundation must be built upon.

What hinders you from feeding on God's Word? Well, here’s some of the things I find to be most common. You think you have too little time—"I just can’t find enough time for that." Or there’s so much going on, so many distractions. And when that’s going on, you’ve got to say, "Well, I have 24 hours in a day just like everybody else. Am I that much more busy and that much more important than everybody else—that some of them can make time for the Word of God and I can’t?" No. We need to make time for the things that are important (Ephesians 5:15–16).

Another thing may be too little desire for God. You're just not thirsting for God. You're not hungering for God. You're not desiring him (Psalm 42:1–2; Matthew 5:6). And that's why you're not that eager to get into his Word and to read it each day.

Another reason why some people neglect the Bible is just too much sin and sloth. The Bible's going to keep you from sin, or sin is going to keep you from the Bible (Psalm 119:11). So if there’s sins in your life that you know need addressing and you don’t want to address them, there’s a pretty high likelihood that you’re just not going to want to read the Bible very much. This happens where sin keeps you from the Bible.

And sloth—let’s face it, if we say, "I don’t have enough time," if we say we have too many distractions, oftentimes we’re just too lazy. We don’t want to put in the effort and the focus and the concentration that it takes to feed on God's Word (Proverbs 13:4; Proverbs 19:15).

And for some of us, it’s just that we have not developed healthy habits. We’d love to read the Bible. We know how beneficial it is. But we’ve never made a habit of it. And habits are good. If something is just a dead habit, that’s not so good. But many of the best things that we get ingrained into our life are healthy habits, where it gives structure and pattern to our life and we don’t even have to make a huge effort to do it after a while because it’s just part of our pattern of life. And you need to make Bible reading part of your daily pattern.

To have to every day get up and say, "Well, am I going to read the Bible today or aren’t I?" That’s not overall the best way to proceed. You say, "I'm going to read the Bible today, and I'm going to get in this habit so that it becomes second nature—that I just read the Bible every day. And I read the Bible with my family. And I need that to become habitual. And that will overcome some of my sloth and it'll overcome some of the distractions." And as I stay in the Bible, it’ll kindle my desire for God, and it’ll strengthen me in my fight against sin, and it’ll make me less lazy.

So I’m speaking here in praise of healthy habits and strong discipline. A part of spiritual fitness is just getting in the habit.

Hey, I’ll let you in on a little secret. I’ve been jogging three miles every other day for many years now—and not because I felt like it. I’m not actually all that fond of jogging. But I need to do it for my physical health because I have a job where I'm not working a lot with my hands and with my body. So I just do it because I have to. And after a while, it got to be a habit. Okay, this is my day. I get up, I go jogging before I do anything else. I lift a few weights, and I need to do that. I built that healthy habit. So now it’s not something I make a decision about. I just know, okay, this is my day—I go and do it.

Now, reading the Bible in many ways is a lot more fun for me than jogging, most times. But even some days—there’s days when I might not feel like going to the Bible. But it’s a habit. So I call the kids: "Bible time." And we all read the Bible together. Or it’s my own personal devotion time, and I read it. And it can become a dead habit—I don’t want it to become a dead habit—but it’s a habit. And you can do something that’s good for you a lot more easily when you just build it as a pattern into your life.

So I just advise you to really stick with it and stay disciplined for a while. And you’ll find that it becomes easier and easier to make this a pattern in your life.

And let’s keep in mind the purpose. You’re training for godliness. You’re not reading just for the sake of reading. You’re trying to develop your spiritual fitness. And Bible intake is the nutrition part of that. You want to get close to God and resistant to evil.

Remember what we learned from James: "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God, and he will come near to you" (James 4:7–8). And a big part of coming near to God is listening to him and meditating on him and spending time in his Word.

And spiritual fitness keeps on growing through this kind of training. "Train yourself to be godly" (1 Timothy 4:7). That’s the purpose. And part of that training is eating right: nutrition. And eating right for your spirit is taking in the Bible. And you take in the Bible in these ways that we’ve talked about:

Read it regularly. Memorize. Meditate and keep on thinking about God and his ways and your own path and what Christ is up to in your life. Listen to others proclaim the Word and to others in Bible study groups and situations. Apply the Word as you’re learning it and say, "Lord, how do you want me to think different or feel different or act different?" And move me by your Spirit to carry that out. And keep a record of what you’re discovering and learning. Write some things down. Keep a journal and see what the Lord does in your life.

I will promise you that if you feed on God’s Word and you apply it, it will have a tremendous transforming effect on your spiritual growth. You’ll come to know God better and better. You’ll see his hand at work in the world around you more and more and in your own life. And your spiritual fitness will be greatly increased as you feed on God’s Word.

Feeding on God's Word
By David Feddes
Slide Contents

Psalm 119 (excerpts)

How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word… I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you… I meditate on your precepts… I will not neglect your word… Your statutes are my delight; they are my counselors… Turn my eyes away from worthless things;  preserve my life according to your word… May your unfailing love come to me, Lord,  your salvation, according to your promise… Do good to your servant according to your word, Lord... Your word, Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens… give me understanding according to your word! Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long. Your commands are always with me and make me wiser than my enemies. I have more insight than all my teachers, for I meditate on your statutes. I have more understanding than the elders, for I obey your precepts… Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path.

 

Amazing Bible

  • Food
  • Light
  • Alarm
  • Weapon
  • Foundation


Feeding on
 God’s Word

  • Read
  • Memorize
  • Meditate
  • Listen
  • Apply
  • Write


Read

The king is to read it all the days of his life. (Deuteronomy 17:19)

Have you not read…? (Matt 12:3, 5; 19:4; 21:16, 42; 22:31 etc)

  • Read in private and as family.
  • Schedule a daily time.
  • Follow a reading plan.


Memorize

I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you... I will not forget your word. (Psalm 119:11, 16)

  • Choose verses you need most: truths, praises, promises, guidance
  • Find frequent time slots
  • Keep verses nearby (phone, paper)
  • Review regularly; meditate on verses


Meditate

On the glorious splendor of your majesty, and on your wondrous works, I will meditate. (Psalm 145:5)

  • Dwell upon, keep thinking about, run through mind over and over
  • Healthy meditation ponders the Lord, His works, and your ways.


Ponder the Lord

Within your temple, O God, we meditate on your unfailing love. (Psalm 48:9)

On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. (Psalm 63:6)

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus. (Heb 12:3)


Ponder God’s works

I will ponder all your work, and meditate on your mighty deeds. (Psalm 77:12)

Great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who delight in them. (Psalm 111:2)

I meditate on all that you have done; I ponder the work of your hands. (Ps 143:5)


Ponder your ways

Ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. (Psalm 4:4)

Thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. You have sown much, and harvested little. (Haggai 1:5-6)

Think of yourself with sober judgment. (Romans 12:3)


Meditate

  • As you meditate on the Bible, the Spirit shows applications to life events. Christ enters more deeply into your life.
  • As you meditate on your life events, the Spirit will bring Bible truths to mind. You enter more deeply into Christ’s life.
  • The Spirit shows your spirit which thoughts and emotions are from Christ.


Listen

Ezra read it aloud… And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law… The Levites read from the Book of the Law of God, making it clear and giving the meaning so that the people understood what was being read. (Nehemiah 8:3-8)

Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Rom 10:17)


Apply

Ask the Holy Spirit:

  • How is your grace touching me in this?
  • What truth do you want me to discover or believe more clearly and firmly?
  • What attitudes need correcting?
  • What action steps should I take?
  • As the Holy Spirit applies the Word to your heart, take action in the Spirit’s power.


Write: journaling by biblical writers

  • Most of Job is a journal of conversation, inner struggle, and encounter with God.
  • Many Psalms are feelings, thoughts, and prayers that have been written down.
  • Ecclesiastes is a journal of mid-life crisis.
  • Jeremiah, Habakkuk, and other prophets write questions and personal struggles.
  • Epistles share personal experiences.


Write: benefits of journaling

  • Remembering rather than forgetting
  • Clarifying impressions and insights
  • Getting realistic and knowing yourself
  • Setting goals and evaluating progress
  • Tracking God’s activity in your life
  • Seeing how God answers your prayers
  • Supporting other spiritual disciplines


Bible is amazing, but must be used in order to help us.

  • Food must be eaten.
  • Light must be used.
  • Alarm alarm must be heeded
  • Weapon must be wielded.
  • Foundation must be built upon.


What hinders you from feeding on God’s Word?

  • Too little time
  • Too many distractions
  • Too little desire for God
  • Too much sin and sloth
  • Too negligent of healthy habits


Train for godliness

  • Spiritual fitness = close to God and resistant to evil. “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. (James 4:7-8)
  • Spiritual fitness grows through training. “Train yourself for godliness.” (1 Tim 4:7)
  • Nutrition is vital for fitness and training.


Feeding on 
God’s Word

  • Read
  • Memorize
  • Meditate
  • Listen
  • Apply
  • Write

 

Last modified: Tuesday, June 3, 2025, 9:50 AM