What Can Happen During Daily Scripture Reading
On this blog, we frequently refer to and encourage the practice of reading Scripture each day. Any Catholic ought to consider developing this habit. But every once in a while, I like to point out things that happen when you read Scripture each day. The following actually happened to me.
If you've read the last two posts about my experience at some board meetings of a Catholic organization, you'll know that not only were those days difficult, but also that I was subject to certain temptations. After returning home, I continued with my daily Scripture reading, following my usual pattern of reading at least one Psalm per day, typically in order, meaning from 1 through 150. (This works out to reading all the Psalms a little more than two times each year.)
If you do this, or something similar, you get to know the Psalms after a while. One of the things you might notice is how they're kind of "grouped" together with certain common themes appearing across a number of consecutive Psalms. (You might even find that certain Psalms become favorites.)
In any case, after returning from the "meetings from hell," the first three Psalms I read were 25, 26, and 27. Again, I read them because I was simply following my habit of reading one Psalm per day, just following the numerical order. So I didn't pick these; they just "came up." Here are the first few lines of each Psalm:
Psalm 25:
Judge me, O Lord, for I have walked in my innocence:
and I have put my trust in the Lord and shall not be weakened.
Psalm 26:
The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the protector of my life: of whom shall I be afraid?
Psalm 27:
Unto thee will I cry, O Lord: O my God, be not thou silent to me:
lest thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the pit.
Hear, O Lord, the voice of my supplication,
when I pray to thee, when I lift up my hands to thy holy temple.
Draw me not away together with the wicked;
and with the workers of iniquity destroy me not:
Who speak peace with their neighbor, but evils are in their hearts.
Now, put this together with the experience I had just had that I described to you in some detail. Can you see why these Psalms spoke directly to me, based upon my own personal experience? Can you see why it seemed as if God Himself - the Bible being, of course, the Word of God - was speaking directly to me? (And, by the way, each Psalm continues with even more that addressed my situation.)
This sort of thing doesn't happen all the time. But it does happen - at least it has on multiple occasions to me. When it does, it's a powerful and moving experience.
If you're not already in the habit of reading Scripture each day, perhaps this will encourage you to do so starting today.
If you've read the last two posts about my experience at some board meetings of a Catholic organization, you'll know that not only were those days difficult, but also that I was subject to certain temptations. After returning home, I continued with my daily Scripture reading, following my usual pattern of reading at least one Psalm per day, typically in order, meaning from 1 through 150. (This works out to reading all the Psalms a little more than two times each year.)
If you do this, or something similar, you get to know the Psalms after a while. One of the things you might notice is how they're kind of "grouped" together with certain common themes appearing across a number of consecutive Psalms. (You might even find that certain Psalms become favorites.)
In any case, after returning from the "meetings from hell," the first three Psalms I read were 25, 26, and 27. Again, I read them because I was simply following my habit of reading one Psalm per day, just following the numerical order. So I didn't pick these; they just "came up." Here are the first few lines of each Psalm:
Psalm 25:
Judge me, O Lord, for I have walked in my innocence:
and I have put my trust in the Lord and shall not be weakened.
Psalm 26:
The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the protector of my life: of whom shall I be afraid?
Psalm 27:
Unto thee will I cry, O Lord: O my God, be not thou silent to me:
lest thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the pit.
Hear, O Lord, the voice of my supplication,
when I pray to thee, when I lift up my hands to thy holy temple.
Draw me not away together with the wicked;
and with the workers of iniquity destroy me not:
Who speak peace with their neighbor, but evils are in their hearts.
Now, put this together with the experience I had just had that I described to you in some detail. Can you see why these Psalms spoke directly to me, based upon my own personal experience? Can you see why it seemed as if God Himself - the Bible being, of course, the Word of God - was speaking directly to me? (And, by the way, each Psalm continues with even more that addressed my situation.)
This sort of thing doesn't happen all the time. But it does happen - at least it has on multiple occasions to me. When it does, it's a powerful and moving experience.
If you're not already in the habit of reading Scripture each day, perhaps this will encourage you to do so starting today.
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