He speaks.
The same Voice comes to Jacob,
Bringing wise laws and decrees to Israel.
No other nation has been so fortunate.
They don’t know these words of life.
So shout your Hallelujah!
(Everyday Psalms, Psalm 147, page 331)
It happens every now and then. I’ll see someone waving enthusiastically and will wave back only to discover they were waving at the person behind me. So awkward!
More often than that, I’ll be on a walk and will greet a person walking the opposite direction only to be greeted in return by silence. I’ve been tempted to say even louder, “How sad! That person is deaf.” Thankfully, I resist such temptations. But silence when someone speaks to you is rude. At least, that’s what my mother taught me.
Because silence is in fact rude when we are spoken to, silence on our part is also rude when we’ve read the Scriptures. For what are the Scriptures other than God’s words to us?
Reading the Scriptures is an event in which God speaks his Word to the reader(s). So each time I pick up my Bible and read, God is speaking to me. That doesn’t mean the words in my Bible are magically turned into speech just for me apart from any need to understand their historical and biblical context. Otherwise, I could read Matt. 27:5 where Judas “went and hanged himself” and then read Luke 10:37 which says, “Go and do likewise,” to great harm. That’s definitely not what I’m getting at! Rather, as I read the Scriptures, I hear God speaking to me in and through and along with the passages I read. I ask myself, “What did God say to the original audience in this passage? And what is he saying to me now?”
And then, having heard God’s voice, I respond in prayer. I don’t continue on my way like the silent passersby whom I greet in vain. When someone speaks, it’s only polite to respond. The same goes with reading Scripture, God’s Word to us.
If I do not pray in response to the reading of Scripture, I haven’t completed my Scripture reading. I’ve left the conversation hanging.
At the same time, I need to let the Scriptures speak. I need to hear what they are in fact saying before I rush on with my own agenda. For God will address me in all kinds of unexpected ways through the Scriptures, leading our conversation in all kinds of unexpected directions. This is one of the reasons why I love the Psalms. Even though I’ve been praying alongside them for decades, they invariably take me in different directions than I would have gone if I’d been praying without them.
And so, each time we sit down with our Bibles, we ought to hear God say, “Hi there. I know you’ve got a lot on your mind. But I’ve got something I’d like to run past you first that I’d love to have a conversation about.” Prayer keeps that God-initiated conversation going.
In a way, Scripture is God waving to us and prayer is us waving back.
Prayer: Thank you, Lord, for not standing aloof from me. Thank you for engaging me, for speaking to me. Thank you for the Scriptures, your Word to me and to all your people. Help me to hear your Voice and to respond to you in my praying. I am floored that you would be interested in having a conversation with me. I’ve got so much to say. Help me start by listening, to hearing what you have to say. In Jesus, the Word of God. Amen.
For further reading: Eugene H. Peterson, Answering God: The Psalms as Tools For Prayer, HarperSanFrancisco, 1990.