"One Thing"

 

It's the last day of the year 2022. 

As I ring out the old year and ring in the new, I give thanks to God for those who shaped me for something good in my life. 

One of them is Robert Murray M'Cheyne. He was a Scottish pastor who died before his 30th birthday. Though he was young, he was well known as "the saintly M'Chenye" throughout Scotland, and his Bible reading plan is still widely used today. 

M'Cheyne developed this Bible reading plan to encourage his church family and himself to read the Bible. In a letter to a young believer, he wrote: 

You read your Bible regularly, of course; but do try and understand it, and still more to feel it. Read more parts than one at a time. For example, if you are reading Genesis, read a Psalm also; or if you are reading Matthew, read a small bit of an Epistle also. Turn the Bible into prayer. Thus, if you were reading the First Psalm, spread the Bible on the chair before you, and kneel and pray, “O Lord, give me the blessedness of the man”; “let me not stand in the counsel of the ungodly.” This is the best way of knowing the meaning of the Bible, and of learning to pray.

It was my sophomore year in college when I was first introduced to M'Cheyene Bible reading plan. It was refreshing, methodical, and challenging. For the first time, I began to understand why David said, "How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!" (Ps 119:103). Slowly but surely, a daily habit of reading the Bible shaped me greatly over the next few years. 

When we follow M'Cheyne's reading plan, we read four different parts of Scripture every day. By reading four chapters on most days, we can read the Old Testament once and the entire Psalms and the New Testament twice every year. 

Yesterday my family and I celebrated Lydia's coming of age. The highlight of the ceremony was the passing of the Bible blessed by her grandparents on both sides. It is my earnest plea that she may know Christ. 

There is one thing I desire most. It is to help my family - my church family as well as my own children - to taste the sweetness of God's word. 

As we leave the past behind and begin a new year, may we press on and cultivate a godly habit of reading the Bible day after day until Christ is formed in us. 

May God bless you and your family with his abundant grace in the New Year. 

In Christ, 

Pastor Victor