I was listening to an XM radio program recently and a young woman called in for help with her problem. She was hooking up with a man who was married to another woman. She herself wasn’t attached to anyone else, so she didn’t think she was doing anything wrong. Nevertheless, some of her friends were telling her that what she was doing with this man was wrong because HE was married (apparently premarital sex would have been OK, but at least they thought doing it with a married man was wrong). This woman felt that what she was doing was fine because he was cheating, not her. The hosts to the program started discussing the issue. They sided with her, that she wasn’t doing anything wrong; it was the guy who was wrong because he was cheating. A background personality on the show piped in that he didn’t agree with them, that she was breaking up a family, so she was wrong too. He started saying, “You’ll lose your blessing! You’ll lose your blessing!” I thought, “Ah, there’s a Christian on this program.” So the main host started to scoff, and could tell from the language used that the guy was referring to the bible. “Where do you get that???” “Well, I’m not up to date on my references, but it’s in there! If you break up somebody’s marriage, you’ll lose your blessing!” So he obviously had enough church background, or Christian family influence, that he knew some biblical principles, but he didn’t know where his thoughts could be found. Well, he kept rummaging around until he was half quoting 1 or 2 of the 10 commandments. I think he said something like “Thou shalt not cheat on your spouse.” One of the hosts said, “What’s another one?” When he said “Thou shalt not kill” they started trying to figure out why someone would make these rules. “Oh, well, somebody took somebody out, so they wanted to put an end to that. And someone said ‘don’t cheat’ because they got cheated on. What are some more of those? I’ll bet we can figure out why they made all those rules.” Then they started looking on Google because they couldn’t remember any more of the c0mmandments. That’s all I heard because I had to get out of the car. Look at this article: While a recent survey conducted by Kelton Research showed respondents know more Big Mac® ingredients than Ten Commandments, taken on the whole the statistics are even more revealing: out of the 1,000 respondents, almost two in five (35%) can recall all six Brady kids, a quarter (25%) could name all seven ingredients of the Big Mac, but only just over one in ten (14%) can accurately list all Ten Commandments. I’m not criticizing non-Christians for not knowing the bible. I just find that it surprises me when they don’t. Somehow I feel that it’s teachings are more woven into our culture than they are. And I think I would be equally surprised at how little some people in my church know the bible. I had a professor who used to say, “Never under estimate how intelligent your people are. Never over estimate how much they know the bible.” This story is one reason I am so passionate about teaching the bible. If the only scripture you are planting in your spirit is what you get on Sunday morning, then I’m going to do my best to give you a good solid dose. That’s how important the scriptures are to us. Christians have always been ‘people of the book’. The bible is our source of truth and doctrine. It’s one of the key places we drink for life and sustenance. It is certainly the most reliable source of information and truth about who God is and how we can know him. But I’m hoping you’ll do more than just get a weekly dose on Sunday mornings, but that you’ll also act on my encouragement to apply a ’spiritual habit’ of reading and memorizing scripture as well. Will you join me in memorizing his word? Like I do with many of the things of life that are good for me, I cycle in and out of being ‘disciplined’ with my scripture memory habit. All I know is that if I don’t plant it in my heart – by memory – I am setting myself up to miss so much LIFE in life.
Catch a Wave 
