When I began blogging my book, Brokenness to Beauty: Transforming Your Brokenness into a Beautiful Life, I stated I would be blogging only portions of my book manuscript not the whole of the book; that is reserved for the published version.
This post is the final part of my second chapter, The Importance of the Bible. The next post after this one will start the chapter I designated for Prayer. But let me now wind up my thoughts on how important I believe the Bible is to our movement from brokenness to wholeness.
I had begun chemotherapy and my husband, Randy, and I were contemplating a weekend away in San Diego to celebrate thirty-five years of marriage before he flew back to West Virginia. I wrote in my blog of us and our relationship to God and His Word:
God has been our “traveling companion” all these years. Where would we be without Him? We shudder to think. So how crazy would it be to look anywhere else than to Him for continuing the journey? He alone has “the words of eternal life”, as Peter so aptly put it so very long ago.
I believe the Bible is vitally important as a foundation for our lives and as a stabilizing factor in our times of trouble. It played a major role in my life by pointing me to the Lord, encouraging me in times of fear and uncertainty, and giving me perspective and hope in the midst of the upheaval of my circumstances. Through regular reading and study of God’s Word, with the goal of putting God’s truths into practice in my life, I have been able to maintain balance and wholeness mentally, emotionally and spiritually during times of physical and emotional distress. I have experienced over and over again the exchange of fear for peace: my fear for the peace of God. I maintain this is available to all who look to the Lord in the same way.
At all times, but especially when we are hurting, whatever the source of that hurt, we need that which is beyond and above ourselves and our human limitations; we need the God who spoke and still speaks today through His eternal Word. His words minister life and hope to us. This whole world will pass away, but God’s Word will last forever.