For being the most important book ever to be written, many people don’t know what to do with a Bible—even Christians. It sits on our shelves, or perhaps dutifully atop our bedside tables, collecting dust as time wears away the glue that holds the binding.
It’s not written entirely chronologically, so the Bible is hard to read straight through. It has parts that are complicated and difficult to understand as well as sections that many of us have heard a million times. And at the end of a day—or perhaps the beginning of one—beset by toddlers who need constant care, fatigue or aches and pains, worries at work, endless errands, and a host of other immediate, pressing concerns, who has time to read the Bible? What’s it good for anyway?
And yet, no other book in all of time has been so powerfully set to speak into the chaos of your busy life, for only the Bible can equip you for wisdom, righteousness, and eternal life.
Wise Living
By those who don’t view the Bible as the Word of God, it is often described as a “good book” that teaches morality and goodness, full of instruction for wise living. Although this is not the whole truth, it is true. As the very word of God, who is himself the source of all wisdom (Prov. 2:6), naturally the Bible is full of wise truths.
The teachings of Jesus throughout the Gospels, and particularly his Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5–7), are filled with sound instruction on how to live good lives in a hard world—something we are able to do when our trust is in the Lord and our security is in his eternal promises.
There is a whole category of books in the Bible called “wisdom literature,” in which we find truths that are observable in the natural world preserved in Scripture. The books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Job all delve into questions of wisdom, ranging from parenting, relationships, and finances to the very specter of life and death.
The Father in Proverbs says to the Son, “Keep hold of instruction; do not let go; guard her, for she is your life” (Prov. 4:13). Surely, this wisdom is worth pursuing, even in the midst of life’s busy seasons.
Right Living
But the Bible is more than a book of wise sayings. As God’s word to us, it reveals his will for our lives. The Bible contains the key to right living because it preserves God’s law. And this is not limited only to the Ten Commandments. Rather, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16–17).
God’s instruction to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 6:4–6 is the same law that Jesus proclaims and fulfills in Matthew 22:37–40: love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.
Scripture’s wisdom literature gives us insight into how to do that well; the books of the prophets demonstrate Israel’s failure to keep this law; the epistles of the New Testament expound upon their meaning and application.
If you want to live righteously, the Bible will tell you how to do it.
Eternal Living
Perhaps, however, as with work, household chores, and the revolving door of parenting mistakes or relationship blunders, you find that living rightly, or even wisely, is an exercise in failure. It’s too easy to drop the ball, and sometimes we just don’t have the energy to pick it up again.
For this reason most of all, the Bible is worth reading. It is worth letting the dishes sit in the sink or the email going unanswered for a few more minutes because the Bible contains what is needed for eternal living. It contains grace.
The Bible tells us that Jesus fulfilled the law (Matt. 5:17). He has perfected our faith (Heb. 12:2), and “raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6–7).
We need this reminder, that Christ has done it. All our striving to live wisely and righteously—as good and godly as that aim is—will not win us what Christ has already claimed on our behalf. These immeasurable riches are “not your own doing; it is the gift of God” (Eph. 2:8).
And these riches include being washed and renewed (1 Cor. 6:11; 2 Cor. 5:17) and given an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade (1 Pet. 1:3–5; Col. 1:12). You need to be reminded of this inheritance that is yours after death and the grace that you have in abundance in life. You need the comfort that comes with knowing the story of God’s promises to his people—including you.
The Bible isn’t just for wise insights. In it, we don’t only find God’s law—we find God himself. He is revealed to us in his word, most specifically through his Son, Jesus Christ (John 1:14). So come meet him in his word, and be refreshed by his promises to you.
