The Shortest Route To Spiritual Perfection

In the first ten chapters of Proverbs, Solomon, the primary author of this amazing book, uses a literary technique by which he personifies wisdom as a woman.  This woman, we might call her Lady Wisdom, calls out to a young man, who represents us, offering insights that will keep him from foolish decisions that will train wreck his life. Obviously, Lady Wisdom is God’s call to you and me to invest our highest and best energies in that which will enable us to lead a good life—one that is successful, satisfying and most of all, pleasing to him. Now that sounds like a huge task—and in many ways, it is—but the path to that kind of life, let’s call it spiritual perfection, is really pretty straightforward.  It is through the Word of God; i.e., to grow in our knowledge of and obedience to God’s revealed truth.  A.W. Tozer said it this way:

“The Word of God well understood and religiously obeyed is the shortest route to spiritual perfection. And we must not select a few favorite passages to the exclusion of others. Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian.”

I know of no other path to the kind of Wisdom that Solomon talks about, no other path to spiritual perfection, no other path to becoming a whole Christian, and no other spiritual discipline that will lead us down that path to a God-pleasing life than by centering our lives in God’s Word—reading, meditating, journaling, praying the Scriptures. Nothing will contribute to your growth, health and success in every area of life as a believer than that.

It is this simple, my friend—not easy, but simple.  If you want to mature in your faith, morph into greater Christlikeness, deepen your knowledge of God, insulate your life from sin, enlarge your Kingdom effectiveness, increase your spiritual power, develop life skills for the daily challenges you face, and in general, live in the blessing zone of God’s favor, you’ve got to be in God’s Holy Word on a regular, if not daily, basis. Here is how King David said it in the very first Psalm:

“Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.”

That’s the kind of life I want!  How about you?

“No man is uneducated who knows the Bible, and no one is wise
who is ignorant of its teachings.”
~Samuel Chadwick

Your Assignment, Should You Choose To Accept It:

As you read the Word of God, Ray E. Baughman, who wrote The Abundant Life, suggested the following method to help you apply the Scripture.  From the passage read, apply the SPECS method by asking yourself these questions:

Sins to forsake?
Promises to claim?
Examples to follow?
Commands to obey?
Stumbling blocks or errors to avoid?