Although it happened unintentionally, the Scriptures have become, for some, a substitute for God.  The Bible has become a barrier between them and God.  “We have our Bible,” they say with a certain amount of pride, “and we need nothing more.” Examine their lives, and you may discover that the Bible has not really made an impact on their lifestyles.  Remember, it is one thing to believe the Bible but something else altogether to allow the Bible, through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, to impact and change your life.

One problem some have is to believe that if they read it in the Bible, they have already experienced it.  It is one thing to read about the new birth in the Bible and quite another thing to be born from above by the Spirit of the living God.  It is one thing to read about being filled with the Holy Spirit and quite another thing to experience the mighty infilling of the Holy Spirit that radically changes our life to a life of adoring wonder and amazement at the things of God.  Reading and experiencing are two quite different things.

Apart from the Holy Spirit breathing upon it, the Bible can be a useless thing, just another book of literature.  It may be fine literature, but there is something infinitely more valuable than the Bible. Tim Tremaine

We might remember singing a little Sunday School chorus that says, “Every promise in the Book is mine.” But we neglect to realize that it is one thing to believe a promise and quite another thing to appropriate it into our lives.  It is like a man stumbling in the darkness of the night, not able to see his hand in front of his face.  His companion asks, “How can you see in this darkness?”

“It’s all right,” the man might say, “I have a flashlight in my pocket.” Simply having a flashlight in your pocket does not light your way until you pull it out and turn it on.  Simply believing the Bible does no good until we pull those promises of God out of the Bible and by faith appropriate them into our lives.

One little saying that goes around in evangelical circles is, “God said it, I believe it, that settles it.” The problem with that is that if you do not believe something to the extent that you appropriate it in your life, do you really believe?  The Bible exhorts us to “walk in the light.” But the light has no value whatsoever unless we are walking in it. Victory Through Surrender