I recently heard a series of lectures called “Making Up Your Christian Mind,” presented by Dr. John Stackhouse at a conference sponsored by IVCF. A recommendation that Dr. Stackhouse gave for enriching one's mind is to keep good company; that is, to surround oneself with smart people. An application of that principle is for one to be in the fellowship of good authors. By selecting a certain author and reading all of his books, one becomes his “friend,” and starts to attain a certain level of familiarity with his ideas.
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On my office shelf, there sits a stack of Bibles. One of them caught my eye, and I used it to look up 2 Peter 3:8. This Bible's cover is made of navy blue bonded leather–this means the cover is made of thin leather stretched over cardboard with adhesive. If you bend the cover, it creases, just like any other cardboard binding.
I used to have a love/hate relationship with said Bible. (Not the content, per se…the cover.) Wander back to high school with me, will you? I had a friend (hello, Adam) who had a Bible with a genuine leather cover.
And he would rifle through the onion skin pages with ease.
And he would bend the entire Bible into lovely “S” shapes, or hot dog rolls.
And the genuine leather cover would spring back to shape every time.
I began to gently work with my Bible cover every day, bending it back and forth, hoping for some worn out cardboard to surrender and look like real leather. (In elementary school, we made Native American “leather” vests out of paper bags by crumpling them up so much that they softened into a fabric-like texture. This is what I wished for my Bible cover.) It was not an obsession, but a quirky time filler during sermons or studies.
The revelation came slowly. (You were wondering when it would come, weren't you?) While I am, indeed, a tactile person with an odd preference for soft Bible covers, this was not the core issue. What I really craved was a worn Bible–worn by my presence in it. A Bible with history. I wanted to be friends with the Author. My friend Adam, even sans genuine leather cover, has a visible familiarity with that Book. (I wonder if he still has that Bible, or has another with a G.L.C….)
My reading list is long. I have such admirable aspirations, and such poor application. The first author with whom I seek to be firmly acquainted is the Author of creation–God. It's a lifelong journey, and sometimes I wonder if, in the end, I will feel a thread of faithfulness binding me to my past and future.
In the meantime, I'm making peace with my plethora of bonded leather Bibles.
