The humility to read

'The Disappearance of God' by Albert Mohler Jr recently came through my door from Monergism Books. Both cheaper and faster than amazon to the US mainland, but anyway. With it came a rather lovely looking pamphlet: 'A reader's guide to the Christian life' filled with ideas about what to read and why to read it. As well as that was a brief, unattributed article: 'The humility to read' which went like this:

I am one person in one place at one time. My experiences and perceptions are limited and coloured by the environment in which i live. Therefore, it would be profoundly arrogant of me to think that i can best grow in the knowledge of God through scripture by myself.

Certainly the Holy Spirit is graciously given to God's children to enable us to comprehend and be conformed to the truths of the Bible. Nevertheless, one of the primary means of grace God uses in the process of our transformation is the universal-historical community of believers. Within that community, God graciously provides leaders of few and leaders of many to equip the saints for the work of ministry.

It is a humbling thing for me to read a book. Most books take at least several hours of combined time to process and i have to forsake other distractions in order to focus and benefit from what i am reading. Most of all, i can't talk back. I am just forced to listen, patiently follow and receive, to think another mans thoughts after him.

One of the new desires placed into the heart of a believer is to think God's thoughts after Him. Let's pursue humility by receiving the thoughts of those who have led us and spoken the word of God to us in the most enduring of all earthly mediums: the book.