Delight in the Word

When I was a little kid I always had hand me down baseball gloves. When my older cousins got a new glove I would get their old one. They were often well used, sometimes to the point of ripping apart. I wanted a new glove so badly I begged my mother. Back in those days there was a reward program called S&H Green Stamps. When you shopped they would give you some stamps that you would fill in a book. When you got enough books filled you could redeem them for items out of a catalogue. One day my mother gave me her books of stamps and told me I could get a new baseball glove. I thought I had died and gone to heaven.

I slept with that glove. I wore it around the house all winter long. I oiled it, folded, it, worked on it, and slept with it some more. I would hold that glove up to my face and deeply breathe in its scent. Ahh, cowhide leather. What a smell. It was wonderful. I was the happiest little boy on earth. I delighted in that glove.

A little over the top you think? Maybe. But that glove meant the world to me. I treasured that glove. My mother sacrificed a great deal for me to have that glove. Most of us have something in our life that we treasure as much as I did that glove. What is it that you treasure? What do you delight in?

Why is it that we can delight so greatly in something so mundane as sports equipment? Or a car, or boat, or purses, or shoes, etc., etc.? Some people would nearly kill over their guilty little pleasures. Why do we delight in these while the most valuable treasure of all goes unused and unvalued? The Word of God is something that is far more valuable than anything I've listed so far, and yet most Christians ignore it until Sunday.

The Psalmist wrote in Psalm 1 "His delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night." He goes on to say, "And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." Wow, what a great promise.

There are scores of other verses that teach much the same as Psalm 1. Psalm 119:14 says, "I have rejoiced in the way of thy testimonies, as much as in all riches." 2 Tim 3:16,17 teaches that the word of God is profitable for the man of God equipping him for all good works.

Spend some time with the scriptures. Learn the value of them. Delight in them.