A lawyer boarded an airplane and sat down next to an attractive blonde woman.  After the plane took off, he decided to have some fun.

He said to her, “Let’s play a game to pass the time.”

She said, “I’m tired.  I just want to sleep.”

He said, “Come on, it’ll be fun.”

She said, “I’m tired.”

He kept at it until she said, “If I let you tell me the game, will you let me sleep?”

He says, “I know you’ll like it.  Here’s the game.  I will ask you a question.  If you don’t know the answer, you’ll give me five dollars.  Then you ask me a question.  If I don’t know the answer, I’ll give you fifty dollars.  OK?”

She agrees and he asks her, “What is the distance to the moon?”

Without speaking, she reaches in her purse and gives the lawyer five dollars.

Then she asks him, “What has three legs and four feet?”

He can’t figure it out so he searches the internet and finds nothing.  Next he calls all his smart friends, still nothing.  Finally he gives up and gives her fifty dollars.  She takes the money and starts to take a nap.

Frustrated he says, “So what has three legs and four feet?”

Without speaking, she reaches in her purse and gives the lawyer five dollars and goes back to sleep.

When He left the earth, Jesus sent us One who would teach us all things.  We have no need for another teacher.  That doesn’t mean other teachers are not good to have, it only means they are not necessary.  Even though we have outgrown our dependence on bottle-feeding and we are well able to chew our own food, we always appreciate another Christian’s insights.  They very often illuminate something we have not seen clearly before.

The scripture (all scripture) is about Jesus.  Everything else we learn from scripture is secondary.  Of course, the scripture is useful for education, but the scripture is, first of all, food for our spirit.  An intellectual grasp of the scripture is necessary, but the intellect must be informed by the spirit, not the other way around.

Jesus is called “the Word”.  The scripture is a distillation of His nature in written form.  Everything is held up by Him.  He begins everything and finishes everything.  When we read the Bible, we must see Him, or we are missing the point.  For example, 1 Corinthians 13 is called ‘the love chapter’.  It is often used to teach us how we should love.  This is a secondary application of this scripture.  The primary application is that this scripture is about Jesus.  It shows us how He loves.  Without the primary, the secondary has no value.

Jesus is altogether lovely.  The time we spend with Him makes us want to spend more time with Him.  He gave us the scripture to tell us what He is like.  To tell us what He does and doesn’t do.  What He wants and doesn’t want.  What He will say and what He will not say.  Many a husband wishes his wife would give him such a book about herself.  Even though a husband adores his wife and wants to be her closest friend, he often lacks a complete understanding of her desires.  Similarly, as much as we desire to spend time with Jesus and lean on His breast like John, we lack a complete understanding of His desires.  We are grateful He has given us the scripture to help us adore Him more completely.

The scripture unveils the beauty of Jesus to us.  The more we see of Him in the scripture, the more entrancing our devotions will be.  Our personal interaction with Him both enlivens our reading and is enlightened by it.  For example, we can read the scriptures that say He keeps no account of wrong, He remembers sin no more, and He makes us righteous.  As we realize we are accepted and beloved, we find our adoration of Him more complete.