Missing Books

            When I looked for the third time and the book was still not there, I wondered if I had forgotten how to use a library. “Excuse me,” I asked the friendly librarian, “Can you help me find the Autobiography of Mark Twain?” We looked, but it was nowhere. The book was missing.

She apologized profusely, but could obviously do nothing about it, so I went back to the computer again. Searching for several other books for my research paper, I was relieved to find something in the catalog that I could use. However, when I scanned the Non-Fiction section for my other books, I once again questioned my library experience.

It was just not there.

I tried another book; also not there. I began to wonder if someone else in the building at that moment was interested in the exact same books as me. When I finally found a book in the children’s section, I was relieved. Picture books are always fun…but of the ten or twelve books I looked for, only two were on the shelf. And as a cherry on top, my computer would not connect to the internet.

So perhaps I didn’t get as much studying in… but a convicting analogy came from the scenario. I am like a library: full of information, of adventures, of thoughts, of experiences. Everything that I hear goes into the “catalog” of my life. However, if I do not apply the things I hear, when people go into my life and look for evidence that sin is defeated, or love is patient, or parents are to be honored, the books are missing. Am I fooling people by having a “catalog” that promises the book, but it is not on the shelf? Are there things in my life that were formerly in the “catalog,” but I have let go missing? As long as people do not look at the shelves, libraries look full—even impressive—with the abundance of knowledge. However, there will be books missing—holes in my life—in everything that I am a hearer of the Word and not a doer. Integrity is having the holes filled. Integrity is being genuine and consistent both in private and public.

In addition, do I advertise that I have “wireless,” and am connected to the Spirit, but inside am disconnected from Him? I have the access, but am I using His power to live?

The answer to this is not trying harder; it’s not writing books yourself and stuffing them on the shelves. The answer is obedience. We must act on the things God speaks to us. He writes the books; He gives us the testimony. May we be faithful.

“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves…But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.” –James 1:22, 25

Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we 

drift away. --Hebrews 2:1