I always pray with joy in my every prayer for all of you
This letter begins on such a positive note. There is joy in this letter that is contagious. Even though these are letters on scrolls, their importance lies in the impact they have on hearts and minds.
Through the wisdom of God, He decided to have a primary way for preserving his truth through letters.
The first letters of Moses were foundational for the nation of Israel, shaping their existence. They were not supposed to wonder what God wants or what pleases God—they were to find it in a scroll.
Moses wrote:
Deuteronomy 30:11-14: This commandment I am giving you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it too remote. It is not in heaven, as though one must say, 'Who will go up to heaven to get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?' And it is not across the sea, as though one must say, 'Who will cross over to the other side of the sea and get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?' For the thing is very near you—it is in your mouth and in your mind so that you can do it.
The written word shows the nearness of the command. Now we even have the command in our pockets through the digital devices we carry everywhere. That is God's way of dominating our consciousness, calling us to draw near to Him in the written word.
Every time we have an encounter with the word of God, we have an encounter with God—most times, ever so subtly. It is amazing that God has made himself accessible to us in His word.
And like Moses said, we don't even need an intermediary. We "don't need to say who will go up to heaven to get it for us."
We have it in the language that we speak, and if we cannot read, we can hear it spoken. That is indicative of the pervasiveness of God all around us. That is God passively with us.
But that Bible is not going to force itself on you. The information in it is not going to diffuse into you. Therefore, putting it on a shelf or under your pillow does not do any good, except as a logistical necessity for you to be able to grab it when you need it.
Paul said that Scripture is a fully loaded encouragement capsule.
Romans 15:4: For everything that was written in former times was written for our instruction, so that through endurance and through encouragement of the scriptures we may have hope.
So there is something special about what is written. You are doing yourself a whole world of good when you make the Bible your best friend—albeit a one-way friend, where it is always speaking to you.
God decided to have himself contained in a book. That can only mean one thing: accessibility. And from God's point of view, there is only an upside to the word.
Paul told Timothy to give attention to reading.
1 Timothy 4:13: Until I come, give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhortation, to teaching.
So back to the focus verse and the fact that we can actually feel Paul's joy—but it was in the context of prayer. After talking about the scriptures at some length, we can spend a few moments speaking about prayer.
The scriptures are God talking to you, and prayer is you talking to God. It's as simple as that. In both cases, they are one-way traffic.
And Paul said that he was praying for the church. For Paul, the highest way to show that he cared about them was praying for them. I don't know how many of us have the same view of prayer. Paul used his prayer as a means of caring for others.
In the previous verse, he said he thanked God whenever he thought about them. So he thanked God for them, and he prayed for them. From there, we see two components of prayer: thanking God and making requests to Him.
One thing that we see with Paul is his prayer life. That is a basic Christian discipline. Praying and Bible reading are two basic Christian disciplines. They are disciplines because we do them regardless of how we feel about them, just like soldiers in the barracks wake up and do certain routines just because..., whether they like it or not. So it is with Scripture and Bible reading.
Someone said, "What if I don't understand what I am reading?" Come back when you have read the Bible from cover to cover. And I mean that sincerely because the Bible is its own context.
Another says it feels like drudgery. To that, I say forbearing is fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23). I'm just saying.
Someone might say, "I don't feel like praying." But no one is talking about feeling here. Next question.
I write all that with a smiling seriousness because daily praying and Bible reading are not things we question, unless you are not a Christian.
Before the codification of the New Testament, we needed preachers to teach about Jesus, but now we still need teachers to teach about Jesus—yet we have it better than the people in the past. And to whom much is given, much is expected (Luke 12:48).
As Psalm 1 tells us, there is a blessedness for the one who prioritizes the word.
Psalm 1:2-3: Instead he finds pleasure in obeying the Lord's commands; he meditates on his commands day and night. He is like a tree planted by flowing streams; it yields its fruit at the proper time, and its leaves never fall off. He succeeds in everything he attempts.
