Printer's Ink....

Life is a bumpy road.  When you are up, and everything is going well, it is easy to become complacent, arrogant even, about your own skills and abilities.  But when you are laid low by one of life's trials, then you search for support and sustenance, and sometimes the comfort of friends or even family are just not enough.

It is only in the last century or two that everyone was afforded the right to read.  Even with the advent of the movable type printing press in the late 1400's, most people still didn't bother.  Reading was only for the wealthy and educated, those who had all of life's advantages already, because only they had the time to spend sitting and doing nothing more than reading.  It is hard to take the time for something as inefficient as reading when your entire life is caught up in simply trying to survive, and you must work dawn to dusk on eeking out a subsistence living.

It is almost magical, the way the world opens up when you can read.  It brings other places to you, and brings you out of your small realm of knowledge, so that you have a whole new understanding.  The printing press changed the world completely, because it put the power of knowledge into the hands of the many, instead of the elite few.  Slowly, words disseminated from the monasteries into the hands of everyday people, and it encouraged them to think beyond the narrow confines of their lives and dream about the possibilities.  Once that happened, things could never be the same again.

Reading allows me to sit in the comfort of my living room and still know the far away places where I would love to travel.   I have knowledge that I otherwise would not be able to access; when I have a question, the answer is at my finger tips, because I can read.

Most importantly, when I want to know about God, I can go to the source and read for myself what God has said in his own words, especially through the life of Jesus, the living Word.  The comfort I seek is to be found in The Word, and it is there for me whenever I want it.

John 1:1

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  (NIV)

Today I am grateful for the opportunity to read God's word, to be able to see the words and interpret them for myself, and to come to an understanding of God's purpose for my life based on my own knowledge through The Word. I start each day in peaceful repose with God through his Word, and it brings me confidence to face the trials and tribulations of life in a way nothing else can.

Dear Lord, thank you for the gift of reading.  It brings me closer to you, and to an understanding of my own life.  It has opened up your creation to me, so that I may better understand you, and it is with thanksgiving that I read your words each morning.  Amen.