Read It

The Bible tells a powerful story of a loving, creator God, the need of fallen humanity for a Savior, and how God has brought it all together in redeeming us and bringing us into a relationship with Himself.  We are called and chosen to be His representatives of this wonderful story.  2nd Corinthians 5 states:
18 Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,
19 that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.
20 Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.

We have been reconciled to God, and we can display that right relationship in the way that we live, allowing the Spirit to flow through us so that we reflect the glory of Christ in us.  We have been given the "word of reconciliation" - the good news of the Scriptures that God has, in His great love, come to redeem fallen humanity.  And, we demonstrate the love of God in the way that we relate to those around us, as He intervenes to make relationships right.

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We can see ourselves through our exposure to the Bible, and we can see how God's story intersects with our own. James 1 says:
23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror;
24 for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.
25 But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.

The men's magazine, GQ has decided it wants to be some sort of book review digest or a petty online book club.  It has released a list of 21 Books You Don't Have to Read.  An article on the CNSNews.com website states that the list includes: Lonesome Dove, The Catcher in the Rye, The Old Man and the Sea, and...wait for it:

The Bible.

Yes, according to the article, GQ writes:

“[N]ot all the Great Books have aged well. Some are racist and some are sexist, but most are just really, really boring. So we—and a group of un-boring writers—give you permission to strike these books from the canon..."

The article also states:

As for the content of the holy book, GQ’s contempt is summed up by this one sentence:

“It is repetitive, self-contradictory, sententious, foolish, and even at times ill-intentioned.”

Perhaps GQ should be on a list of publications that should not be read.  John Stonestreet at The Point contends:

Of course, dissing scripture is as old as the hills but with falling circulation and GQ becoming the magazine no one wants to read, their powers that be are trying to shock folks into becoming readers.

But he points out:

...as Shane Morris writes at BreakPoint.org, “Between the fourth and twentieth centuries, basically no movement, reform, revival, conflict, work or art, symphony, or piece of literature in the West came about independent of this grand dialogue with biblical faith . . . If you don’t understand the Bible, you can’t understand the West.”

 Todd Starnes relates at FoxNews.com:

The truth is the Bible documents the greatest story ever told – a story about agape love and sacrifice and redemption – everlasting life.

And it’s also the best-selling book of all time – more than 5 billion copies sold, according to Guinness World Records, which also reports that the whole Bible has been translated into 349 languages and says at least one book of the Bible has been translated into 2,123 languages. Statistics Brain estimates even more Bibles have been printed – just over 6 billion.

“The Holy Bible is God-breathed, it is living and active, and it is sharper than a double-edged sword,” the Rev. Franklin Graham wrote on Facebook. “There is nothing more powerful, and there’s nothing more needed by mankind than the Word of God.”

It's not surprising - we live in a culture that has developed a hostility to the Word and to Christianity. That can be discouraging, but it should also be motivational to try to love God's Word more and to live it more accurately.

There has been plenty of discussion in Christian circles about Bible illiteracy and our need to know the Word more.  A culture that is seeing the Bible in action is a culture that can experience the redemptive elements portrayed in Scriptures, as they are demonstrated by God's people.  We can take our role seriously as ambassadors of Christ.

It is unfortunate that there are those who misunderstand or are willfully ignorant of the Scriptures. Because in the Bible, we see ourselves - James talks about the Word as a mirror.  We can see how our story intersects with God's story: how our loving Father has provided salvation for fallen humanity, and how we have our own personal need for a Savior.  The Scriptures are alive, and God wants to bring them to light for every human being.