1 Chronicles 15:13 “It was because you, the Levites, did not bring it up the first time that the Lord our God broke out in anger against us. We did not inquire of him about how to do it in the prescribed way.”

The simple fact of the matter is that if you want things to turn out right, you need to seek God for how He wants things done. Often enough, in fact, almost always, He’s already indicated the right course in the Bible, as David says here, “as prescribed/according to the rule.” We tend to run off in whatever way seems right to us, and don’t even bother to ask God about it. The thing is, the “rule” is to seek God! In this particular instance, failing to seek God had resulted in the death of Uzzah, who had tried to “help God out” by steadying the Ark when the oxen pulling the cart stumbled. (1 Chronicles 13:9-10) The problem was, God had given clear instructions for how the Ark was to be handled, back when it was built during the Exodus, and those instructions were that it was to be carried by Levites, not put on a cart in the first place. Uzzah’s death certainly put the fear of the Lord into David and all those with him! We aren’t called to handle the physical Ark of the Covenant, but we do handle the truths of God, and we are not to do so flippantly. As Paul told Timothy, we are to “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.” (2 Timothy 2:15) We don’t handle physical holy things, but physical things are temporal to begin with, and we handle the eternal Word of God. We are never to do so casually, or seek to bend and distort it to say what we want it to. That’s a good way to get cut to pieces, because “The word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” (Hebrews 4:12) We are to handle it as God directs, to achieve the results He desires. (Isaiah 55:11)

This is an area in which I really need to be careful, because familiarity indeed breeds contempt, and I am certainly familiar with the Bible, having read it through for the first time before I was 10, and many times since then. It is a physical impossibility for me to read a Bible passage I haven’t read repeatedly before, but it is glorious reality that God gives me new insight very frequently, as I read the Bible each morning. For example, I don’t think I’ve ever written on this verse before! I am to treat God’s Word as holy, not in the sense of a particular translation, but as what He was saying through the individuals who recorded it. I have been saddened by people who have clung to a particular translation, essentially saying that it alone was the “holy” Bible. I’ve been bilingual all my life, and I know that translation doesn’t work that way! I have been blessed through many different translations, but haven’t found a perfect one yet, and don’t expect to. However, I do expect God to speak to me through what I read, and I certainly haven’t been disappointed!

Father, thank You for this reminder. It’s an unexpected insight from this particular passage! Help me indeed rightly handle Your Word, just as Paul told Timothy, so that it may have its full work in and through me, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!