RUN LIKE A CHAMPION

Making Disciples – 5
Sammy Tippit: We’ve been talking about the Word of God, the importance of the Bible in our lives, and how that helps us as we take the Word of God into our lives to grow into the image of Jesus. Corey and I have been talking and sharing together about the Word of God, and I want us to continue that. Jesus made a statement. He said, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.'”

Jesus talked about the Bible being our food, our spiritual food. As we read the Bible, as we study the Bible, as we take the Bible into our hearts, it becomes bread, spiritual bread for life for us. You were talking about a love letter, and Jesus uses the illustration of bread, food, spiritual food. I think it’s important for us to talk about…
Okay, the Bible is God’s Word, but a lot of people read and think, “Oh man, I don’t even know where to start.” You don’t really read the Bible or study the Bible like you do any other book, so I want us to talk about… I have five ways in which we can take the Word in, so I want to talk about each one of those for the next period of time.
1. Read the Bible. How do you recommend…? Let’s say somebody is just brand new. They’re saying, “Man, I love Jesus. I’ve come to know him. What do I do? Where do I start reading? Do I start in Genesis? Do I start in the beginning and read straight through? Are there other particular things…?” How would you recommend people who are brand new start reading the Bible?
Corey Webb: That’s a great question, Sammy. What I would recommend is that you look to the New Testament, the first four books of the New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the four Gospels where we learn about Christ’s birth, life, death, and resurrection. The book of John is a very life application-oriented book. John really wrote about a lot of the detail of Jesus’ life and his love for us, so I would recommend starting in the book of John.
Sammy: Okay. The book of John, just so you know, looks like it’s about two-thirds or three- fourths of the way into the Bible. If you have a Bible, go about three-fourths of the way, and you’ll find what we call the Gospels. Those are the life accounts of Jesus where you can read of the life accounts.
Now when I have read the Bible, there are a couple of things I have found are really good for me. One is to read it systematically, not try to read the book of John all in one day but to maybe read a couple of chapters or one chapter. I read over it a couple of times then, and each time I read, I pray and say, “Lord, speak to my heart.” We’re talking about life and love letters. There’s always something that will jump off of this page and right into my heart.
Corey: Absolutely.
Sammy: It’ll be for me for that day. It’ll be my bread, my daily bread for that day. So read the gospel of John. What about this? That’s the New Testament. To keep a balance, one thing I encourage people to do to start off is start reading one psalm or two psalms every day. Read one thing in the New Testament and one thing in the Old Testament. Then just read through that. Then when you finish that, go to another book. Is that…?
Corey: Oh, you bet. I think that’s a great way to do it. The Psalms are wonderful. You can get a lot of encouragement, a lot of insight from God’s heart, his love, as David wrote a lot about the challenges in life, the everyday things he worked through. Another great idea is that there are 31 Proverbs, and you can read a proverb a day. You’ll get some extra wisdom and insight from that.
Sammy: Yeah. Actually, what I’m doing right now for this month is to read a chapter in Luke and a chapter in Proverbs each day. It’ll take a whole month for me to get through those two books.
Corey: That’s great.
Sammy: But read it, I think, with an eye and heart for Jesus. “Jesus, what do you want to say to me? What is it you have for me today?” Read the Word.
2. Hear the Word. Now what do I mean when I say to hear the Word? Hear the Word preached. I think church is important. We’re living in a day when a lot of people don’t think church is important, and I know a lot of people who are even listening to this don’t have churches in their countries. But wherever and whenever you can hear the Word of God, there’s something special about it.
Corey: Right. Right. You know, something I’ve been learning about hearing the Word of God as I’ve been evaluating hearing over my own journey and life… I can remember years ago when our oldest daughter, Meagan, was 3 years old. I had gotten home from work, and I was sitting in my chair physically, but I wasn’t there emotionally or mentally.
Meagan was trying to interact. She was trying to say something to me. She said, “Daddy, daddy!” I was still working at work, but I did catch what Bonnie said, and she said, “Meagan, I’m sorry. Daddy is not here with us right now.” I did catch that, and I kind of woke up. But what I believe God has been teaching me about hearing the Word is to be emotionally connected to God in that moment with the message that he has for me.
Sammy: Yeah. You know, a lot of people may not understand this. I’m an evangelist, and I travel, but I’ll tell you what. When I’m at home on Sunday, I’m in my church, and I’m sitting there just like anyone else because I need the Word of God. I don’t care if you’re a pastor, leader, or whatever. You never get to the place where you don’t need to hear the Word of God.
The Bible tells us there’s a reason for it. That is, “…faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” So there’s something that happens. You can’t explain it. It’s supernatural. Something happens on the inside of me when I listen to the Word of God, when I listen to someone just open up the Word and begin to speak the Word of God. Faith begins to rise in my heart. Of course, you know the church where I go. My pastor is just a man who preaches the Bible. Boy, it has been so helpful to me just to hear the Word of God. Let’s take one other thing.
3. Meditate on the Word. We’re reading the Word, hearing the Word, and then meditating on the Word. Psalms says, “Thy Word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.” So what does it mean to meditate? The Scripture talks about meditating on God’s Word day and night. What does it mean to meditate on the Word of God?
Corey: That’s a good question, Sammy. As you read over a passage of Scripture… We even read in Joshua 1:8 and get challenged to meditate on God’s Word day and night. To meditate is to read over it. It’s to emotionally connect with it, to apply it to our inner man. It’s a relationship piece. When we meditate on it, we’re going over that truth. We’re asking ourselves, “How is that truth useful to me in this moment of my life?”
Sammy: One of the things I do is, after I read the Word and leave that time when it’s just the Lord and me and I’m reading the Bible to just go about my daily activities, try to think back on what I read. “Okay, Lord, what is it?” I’ll tell you one really quick story. I mentioned earlier that I had been diagnosed with cancer.
The day I was diagnosed with cancer, the Lord spoke to my heart from Hebrews 12:1. I had read that passage. That was in my Bible reading that day. It said, “…let us run with endurance the race that is set before us…” The word run just kept coming to me. Run. Run. Run. When I went into the doctor’s office, he said I had cancer.
We talked about what I was going to do, and I knew I needed surgery. I asked, “How do I prepare for the surgery?” He said, “You need to lose some weight, and you need to build endurance.” As soon as he said it, I knew what I needed to do. The Lord had already spoken to me. “…let us run…” So I knew running was what he wanted.
Okay. There are three things I hope everyone will take from this today. First, read the Word. Don’t read it religiously but with a heart saying, “God, speak to me.” Second, hear the Word. Third, meditate on the Word of God. If we will do those three things, that will be bread for us for that day, and we’ll be able to partake. We’ll grow. Is that right? We’ll grow into God’s image, Christ’s image?
Corey: Yes. Absolutely.
Sammy: I hope you’ll take these three things and apply them to your life, to your heart, and you will begin to grow in Christ. We’ll talk about some more things in just a moment.