The entrance of Thy words giveth light
IF YOU WERE to visit the British Museum in London, England, you would see a very large handwritten Bible, with a huge chain around it. Why was it chained?
Before the printing press was invented, every Bible had to be copied by hand. It took many months of hard work. There were very few Bibles and they cost hundreds of dollars. Even if you wanted to copy the Bible, you would have trouble finding one to copy. So preachers would have the great Bible chained to the pulpit so people could come and look at it, but not be tempted to steal it.
If you had lived over 400 hundred years ago, the only way you could read God’s Word would be to do as this boy and girl are doing in the picture — go to a church and read it. Often there would be a line of people waiting to get a chance to read it too.
Just think, boys and girls, you can go to your room and pick up your Bible right now. It belongs to you maybe you even have two or three. You can read it any time, and you don’t have to stand in line for hours just to see it. But is God’s Word precious to you? Are you reading it every day? Let us thank the Lord that He has given us a Bible of our own to read, to love and its sacred texts to memorize. How good He is to give them to us!
ML-11/02/1969