Leopards?

In Psalm 119, the Psalmist is expressing His love for God's Word. We read:
129 Your testimonies are wonderful; Therefore my soul keeps them.
130 The entrance of Your words gives light; It gives understanding to the simple.
131 I opened my mouth and panted, For I longed for Your commandments.
132 Look upon me and be merciful to me, As Your custom is toward those who love Your name.
133 Direct my steps by Your word, And let no iniquity have dominion over me.

Here, he is expressing a high and devoted view of the Scripture, and indeed, this Psalm becomes a standard by which we can measure our own love for and appropriation of the Word of God.  We know God as we not only fellowship and commune with Him through prayer and worship, but as we read about Him and realize that the Bible is a template for a consistent meeting with Him - our living Lord will express Himself to and through us as we spend time in the Scripture.

+++++

Jesus is the Word who became flesh, and just as He lives today, His words to us are words of life that
can totally transform us. Hebrews 4 states:
12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

Perhaps you have heard of Chrissy Teigen - if not, maybe you are familiar, to a certain extent, with John Legend, her husband.  They could be described as a pop culture power couple: he is a singer and actor who recently played Jesus in Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert; she is, according to ChristianToday.com, a "model and TV personality."  That website said that Teigen, "might need to start reading the Bible to learn about the man her husband is depicting, as she admitted on Twitter that she's not familiar with the Bible."

Chrissy attended a rehearsal for the musical presentation.  Christian Today stated:

Aside from watching Legend fly, Teigen joked she had been excited to see leopards on the stage but that turned into a disappointment.

"John said there would be leopards today," Teigen wrote on Twitter. "But it's lepers. I uh, am not good with the Bible," she added.

It goes on to say:

In 2017, Teigen told a follower that Jesus Christ doesn't shape her beliefs after someone asked, "Is Jesus shaping your personal culture or is the culture shaping you?"

But cold-case detective J. Warner Wallace contends that Teigen is far from being the only one who is "not good with the Bible."  In a Fox News piece, he related some statistics, such as:

A study conducted by Lifeway found that while nearly 87 percent of American households possess a Bible, most people who live in these homes (53 percent) barely open the holy book.

A scant 19 percent of Christians say they read the Bible every day, and only 20 percent report thinking about biblical truths throughout the day.

And, there's this morsel:

A 2017 Barna Group study (in association with Summit Worldview Ministries) found that only 17 percent of “Christians who consider their faith important and attend church regularly actually have a biblical worldview.”

Wallace, who lives in California, said:

I might be able to call myself a Californian based on my being born and raised here. But when challenged by an increasingly secular culture, Christians need to be able to offer more than “I was born and raised in the church.”

He concludes by saying:

If we want to call ourselves Christians and have a positive influence on the world around us, we’ll need an informed, forensic faith that can stand up in the marketplace of ideas. Christians need to understand the difference between a leper and a leopard. We need to be “good with the Bible.”

So, there are a couple of questions that can emerge for us today.   One is: are we "good with the Bible?"  And, another follows from that, "How good?"  I think there are varying degrees of what is termed, "engaging" with the Bible.  There are some that possess one, but perhaps, as Lifeway discovered, never crack the covers.

In order to experience more of the reality of Jesus, the Word made flesh, it is vital that we open the pages and begin to read.  In going deeper, we go beyond merely reading into careful study and then consider carefully applying what we discover.  We allow the Spirit to open up and to enliven the words on the page - it's like reading God's truth three-dimensionally rather than two-dimensionally.  God wants to reveal more of Himself to us through His Word, which is "living and active," according to Hebrews 4.

We can carefully evaluate whether or not the phrase, "I'm not good with the Bible," applies to us. But, there is always the promise of getting better, seeing the Bible come alive in our hearts, and to be expressed through our lives.