The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14
Guitar… She said girls think it’s attractive when a guy plays guitar…
The drive home couldn’t feel longer. But as soon as my dad unlocked the front door, I darted through the house like a leashless Labrador. Lifting the once dull instrument I had promised to learn now seemed romantic. The curved wood glistening from a shiny finish felt strangely soft in my grip, and as my rusty fingers held the first chord I had learned, my right hand dragged across the dust-coated metal strings. The E major roared.
All the knowledge I gathered over the last year suddenly made sense. Months of painstaking monotony were, in a moment, transformed. What was once just a guitar was now a means to know her.
For most of my life, scripture was a necessary evil. It sounds heretical, but as one who despised the very nature of reading, nothing was as uninteresting as the Bible. The black leather-bound binder hugging hundreds of pages, each filled with difficult words, reeked of prosaic verbage.
The only problem... it was the word of God. How could I not read it? After all, it is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” All the other scriptures I had been pushed to memorize encouraged the study of scripture too. Psalm 1’s analogy of a man meditating on God’s law mirroring a tree planted by streams of water carried undeniable logic.
But it just didn’t resonate with me. I didn’t delight in it as the psalmist did. How was one supposed to contemplate God’s word day and night? I was Generation Z. There were fashion trends and content creators to keep up with; goals to achieve, girls to chase, and a world to please. I didn’t have time to waste on white noise theology and unrelatable content. My life was too busy to indulge in lifeless texts.
After surrendering my life to Jesus in college, my excitement peaked. Surely scripture would now come alive. Pages would be like Instagram reels, pulling me in deeper, feeding my dopamine addiction. Instead, it got worse.
Boredom fostered guilt. Wading through verses was still impossible, not because of unrelatability but because I still didn’t enjoy it. I sprinted after scripture, forcing myself to love it. Yet all it did was bring shame and condemnation. I fixated on reading for the sake of getting it done, and the distance between God and me grew.
Nothing had changed from childhood. When I gave my life to Jesus, repeating the traditions my parents and churches had taught seemed right. But it didn’t occur to me that the outward reflections were meant to stem from inward postures. I was only doing them because I was supposed to. Like learning the instrument, I played scripture out of duty, not love.
But then it happened. I met Him. I fell in love with Jesus after experiencing His love for me. Suddenly, the leather felt different. The pages weighed lighter and the words tasted sweeter. The scripture drilled in my mind as a child began breathing, and all I wanted was more. Not because I liked words, but because I loved Jesus. The pages were but glimpses of my Father; a means to an end. God’s word was no longer just a book, it was Him.
Reading, memorizing, and praying didn’t hook me like an addiction. Meditating still required dedication as I found my flesh weak. The difference was in purpose. I wanted intimacy with Jesus, and the discipline meant knowing Him more. It was worth it. Love isn’t an absence of difficulty, but it provides the power to overcome it.
Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long. Remember. O Lord, your great mercy and love, for they are from of old. Psalm 25:4-6
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