READ THE BIBLE

As a young mouslet, I was religious, even earning a perfect attendance Sunday School pen with a long tail of bars representing eight years. One day I was reading my Bible and ran across the verse about earth-life lasting only a few years but spirit-life being for eternity. Always! Infinity! I interpreted it as “Be good or you’ll burn in hell forever.” Oh dear!

I resolved to read the Bible for half an hour every day. Picture this. I was the second slowest reader in the eighth grade – the one slower than me being sixteen years old. With timed readings, my classmaters applauded when I finished. But I did have the willpower of a mule in those days of yore. If I said I was going to read for thirty minutes, I was going to read for thirty minutes, come hell (pun intended) or high water.

With the Bible being so intriguing to a teenager (!) my mind wandered a lot. When it wandered for three minutes, I made a note of it and read an extra three minutes. Those minutes accumulated. Many days I spent two hours trying to read for thirty minutes. If I missed a day, I doubled up the next day. (I told you I was stubborn, didn’t I?)

Naturally, I did a 180 when I got to college. I probably preferred cleaning the toilet over reading the Bible.

Now I’m older and wiser. I actually like to read the Bible, and I know I can’t get to heaven on a work truck. I don’t read any faster, though.