One of the many amazing characteristics of my father-in-law Curt, who lost his 14-year battle with Multiple Myeloma back in February 2020, was his uncanny ability to know where he was at all times. I can remember one of the first times I was driving with my wife Becca to George Fox University, where we both attended college, and we found ourselves completely lost somewhere in the west hills of Portland. Now as young-ish drivers before the days of GPS, you can probably imagine the conundrum we were in. How would we find our way back on the road to Newberg, if we could not even establish where we were to begin with? Thank goodness Becca’s dad was just a phone call away.
Upon giving him a ring, he first had us describe the surrounding landscape, then some of the buildings around us, and then, finally, the street names around us. Between those three elements, Curt knew EXACTLY where we were, and he guided us out of our mystery region and back on the right path to our destination. Talk about some sweet relief for the both of us.
In the same way that Becca and I needed her dad for grounding direction, we all desperately need God’s Word as a centerpiece in our lives. To make sense of this life, our purpose, and the very path we are to be walking, we must go back to the Bible as our guidebook. As it says so powerfully in Hebrews 4:12 (ESV), “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”
God’s Word to us in the Bible is where we find hope for how to rectify the turmoil of our day. The Bible offers us comfort, as is so profoundly detailed in Psalm 23. It provides us correction when we find we have gone astray and need to be brought back to reality (2 Tim. 3:16). It gives us hope when so much of what the world offers as a remedy fails us (Ephesians 1:17-23). It provides our purpose in life when we look for meaning and find nothing but abstruse explanations (Jer. 29:11-14). It gives us the only full, and complete, revelation of who God is, and what we can know about His character (Ex. 34:6-7). The Bible then, in all its magnificence, offers us the most important gift possible apart from our eternal relationship with Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. It gives us direction in ALL matters of living and affirms the legacy God bequeaths on us when we choose to follow Him.
The truth is, without an anchor to lock us in place, there is no outer-limit as to where the wind might blow you in life. Even if the wind blows you to seemingly solid ground, that ground will continue to shift, and you will find yourself tossed over and over again in the storm. The tides of culture are never fully at rest.
For us at Harvest, this means we choose to stand with God’s Word and plant our feet firmly on the foundation of Jesus Christ. Because our first core value is this: We are focused exclusively on Bible-centered teaching. To hear from God, we go to His Word first, and to everything else second.
And we hope you will too.
We learn from Jesus as He quotes Deuteronomy 8:3 in response to Satan’s twisting of Scripture in Matthew 4:1-11, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God (Matt. 4:4, ESV).’”
And with God’s guidebook at our disposal, we never again have to “live on bread alone” in this world.
“Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of His purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, He confirmed it with an oath. God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek (Heb. 6:17-20, NIV).”
QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF …
- Do you look to outside voices for your primary source of information about God, or do you go to His own Word first?
- Is the reading and study of the Bible part of your daily rhythm? And if not, what can you do to make it so?
- Do you have a relationship with Jesus Christ? Do you believe His Word to be true? If not, would you be willing to talk to someone here at Harvest, or another follower of Jesus, about who He is and why it is worth having a relationship with Him?