We often read the Bible as if it were fundamentally about us: our improvement, our life, our triumph, our victory, our faith, our holiness, our godliness. We treat it like a book of timeless principles that will give us our best life now if we simply apply those principles. We treat it, in other words, like a heaven sent self-help manual. But by looking at the Bible as if it were fundamentally about us, we total miss the point – like the two on the road to Emmaus. As Luke 24 shows, it’s possible to read the Bible, study the Bible, and memorize large portions of the Bible, while missing the whole point of the Bible. It’s entirely possible, in other words, to read the stories and miss the Story. In fact, unless we go to the Bible to see Jesus and His work for us, even our devout Bible reading can become fuel for our won narcissistic self-improvement plans, the place we go for the help we need to “conquer today’s challenges and take control of our lives.”
~ Tullian Tchividjian