The Need to Read

"Look what I found!" my husband called excitedly as he came in from from an errand with our son the other day. He had a Bible commentary under his arm and an old video of "A Man Called Norman", something we had enjoyed 20 years ago. Greg likes junk shops and old book stores, so he had taken his father to one. "I got all this for $1!" Howard went on.

Then yesterday, Howard told me he was taking me there. "I want to get another one of those commentaries," he said, "they had a whole set of 12."

"Well, if they're only a dollar," I said, "why don't you get the whole set for $12? We can find a place for them somewhere."

When we got in the store (that was overflowing onto the parking lot) we headed to a musty back room where he immediately went to the books. The set was quite handsome, seemingly never used and still in their book jackets. "How much would you take for all of them?" Howard asked.

"One dollar!" the man said. So now Howard is as happy as a kid with a new toy. (I'm enjoying reading them, too.) My husband was on the look-out for a big-print Bible, too, since he left his in Kansas the other day and hasn't been reunited with it yet. He found one with medium print, and I got a Thesaurus, all for $1.50, including the 12-volume commentaries! (I looked up the commentaries on the internet, and found they cost over $400!)

I don't know if it's because of the internet with its plethora of information, e-books, and Bible info, or if people don't read as much these days, but it seems books are waning in popularity. (Just when I'm loving seeing my books in print!) Or maybe it's that we're running out of space! My Kindle holds 500 books--a compact library!

I just read a piece in the AARP Bulletin that proposed the government buy seven fewer fighter jets and spend the money instead on "a handheld computer tablet for every first-grader in America". The generation gap widens!

A few days ago as I was preparing to speak at the Wednesday evening service at church, I said to son Jamie in our phone conversation, "I've been putting prompt notes on cards, but when I go back, they don't trigger anything!"

"You need to write your whole message down," he said. "That's what I do. Now that would never work for Dad, he's so extemporaneous, but it would for you."

"But that would be a dozen pages!" I protested. "And when I try to pick up a sheet of paper, it's hard to grasp!"

"You could do like me, I put them on my ipad," he mused. That would never work for me, even if I had an ipad. He advised me to turn up the corners on my papers, and it worked! I got through the old-fashioned way, and people were very kind with their comments.

We may live in a new age, but I think there will always be people who love to peruse old book stores, and people who like the solid feel of a book in their hands and the ease of turning back or forward a few pages. One Book, the Bible, has stood the test of time, and though people may find new ways of reading it, it will always echo across the centuries as the Word of God. It is sharper than a two-edged sword and more powerful than any fighter jet.

Ecclesiastes 12:12 says, "Of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh." Verse 13 concludes, "Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man." Enough said.