Our Compass

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Wednesday morning, the 5th of June, 2024, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We start in the Book of Revelation 22:18-19:

“If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life,…”

You and I need to warn people about the word of God and how sacred a book it is. Come on, let’s be honest, the Bible is Jesus in print. If somebody says to you, “Show me this Jesus you are always talking about”, give him a Bible. It is the best gift you can give anybody, especially when a young man is graduating from university or a young girl is graduating from high school, a Bible. I remember my mother buying me a Bible when I had left junior school. I didn’t really understand it. It was in the King James Version, but I treasured that book especially. The Bible is our pathfinder in this jungle that you and I are living in. 

When a hunter or explorer walks through the midst of a dense jungle, that compass is a matter of life and death to him. If he loses that compass, he will die in that jungle, he will never find his way out. We need to look after our Bibles like that hunter or that explorer cherishes his compass. It shows him the way out. Do you know, the ancient scribes in Jerusalem were called by God to write out the word of God, the Bible. Before they started to write the scriptures, they would go and have a bath. They would wash their bodies, put on clean clothes before they started to write out the word of God. If they made one mistake, and that goes even today, if they made one mistake when they were writing out the scriptures, they would destroy the scriptures and start again. 

You and I need to respect God’s word a lot more than we are doing at the moment. They tell me that in some of the persecuted countries, where they meet underground they take a Bible and they take it apart, page by page, and they circulate the pages of the Bible through the congregation. They take it home and they memorise those scriptures, they bring them back to the next meeting and exchange that page for another one. We really need to memorise the word of God. 

The young orthodox children in the Jewish faith memorise the first five books of the Bible before they become of age. That is quite something. I remember distinctly going to a Muslim’s home to have a cup of coffee with him, and I put my Bible on the carpet next to my chair, and he walked in and he said, “Sir, please don’t put that book on the floor. Put it on a coffee table.” That’s right. Let us start to respect God’s holy word. 

Jesus bless you and have a lovely day,
Goodbye.