When I was a boy of ten, Friday nights were exciting. Mom and dad and us four boys piled into the family station wagon and went to Bel Air. Mom and dad went grocery shopping, but first dropped us boys off at the public library. That hour was my time … my time to be transported across the seas to Africa and the Egyptian pyramids, to sail with Magellan around the world, or to visit the Great Wall of China. And all of these travels were through books. I remember my mother reading “The Secret Garden” to us boys, one chapter a day. I couldn’t wait to find out what happened next. In 1963, our bus schedule got me to school early. I would get a hall pass from Miss Hidecker and hurry to the school library for fifteen minutes looking for books to read. I liked science fiction, Egyptology, and stories of nature. History, inventions and Napoleon were intriguing. But Rev. John Smith gave me a love for reading the Bible. He knew Greek and Hebrew and seemed to relish studying for his next sermon. Paul admonished his protégé, Timothy in II Timothy 2:15, “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” I am grateful for those wonderful people who have gone before me who gave me a love of God’s Word. Read it and study it, because it will change your life.
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