It wasn't what I wanted it to be

 I recently found myself reading a fictional book for my own enjoyment for the first time in years. I can't say I completely enjoyed the experience. The more I read of the book, the more I felt I would be much better served to read the Scriptures.

Let me explain a bit about that book. It was fiction, written in the 1800's, set during the Spanish Inquisition, and was a 'Christian' book. I can't say I opposed much of the 'Christian' content, most of it stuck to the Scriptures and gave God all credit for being in control. I did have issues with the comments that referred to people giving their life to God, or choosing to trust in Him, but beyond that I can't say I opposed much.

The trouble with this book was even while it gave (mostly) glory to God for salvation and all happenings in the fictitious characters lives, I still found myself wrapped up in a story that held little of Scripture and seemed just as man centered as most other things in this fallen world.

And so I found myself thinking, time and again, that I should discard the book and pick up my Bible. Sometimes I did just that, not actually discarding the book but setting it aside in favor of Scripture, and sometimes I ignored my own inner promptings...or the Lord's promptings...and kept reading because I wanted to get a better feel for the Spanish Inquisition and I wanted someone to paint me a picture, in this case with words, of what it was like for the people that experienced it.

When I finally came to the last page, weeks after starting the book, I can't say I had all that much of a better understanding of what life was like for those that went through such a great trial and persecution. It was, quite honestly, not worth the time it took me to read it. I would recommend the book to others that enjoy reading for fun but I did not gain enough from the book to make it worth my time.

And so I walked away from that experience having learned numerous things but a greater understanding of the Spanish Inquisition really wasn't one of them. But having so recently read that book I can say without a doubt that there is much to be said for how one approaches anything they read. In this case I approached that book wanting to feel...to experience...what life was like for those persecuted Christians.

I approached that book, a book based on true happenings that even had characters, although not the main ones, that really lived through the Inquisition, wanted a deeper understanding of what those that lived through it, or died in it, experienced. And I came away from it thinking the author held only a surface level understanding of what it was like and therefore was unable to portray the emotions and the...life...those poor people endured in this book.

I failed to have the experience with that book that I hoped, even expected to have, but I did gain an experience I did not expect. I discovered, not for the first time, that my heart really isn't in books anymore. Once upon a time I loved them, I devoured them in numbers so great that I could not hazard a guess at how many I read. I collected them. I enjoyed the look of them, the feel of them, the smell of them. I loved the stories and the characters in them.

I still enjoy a book...in theory. I like the look of them, the feel of them, the smell of them. But...I no longer find myself drawn into the stories as I once was. I now find myself thinking of the Scriptures I could be reading and how even the 'christians' in books I thought came from a reformed company are really only man centered with just a bit of Scripture tossed in here or there.

And so here I sit, writing about a man-centered experience, in this case my own, that has no point to it besides these thoughts have weighed heavy on my mind and heart in the aftermath of reading that book. A book I read at the same time I found myself soaking in Ecclesiastes.

The words of the Preacher,[a] the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

2 Vanity[b] of vanities, says the Preacher,
    vanity of vanities! All is vanity.
3 What does man gain by all the toil
    at which he toils under the sun?
4 A generation goes, and a generation comes,
    but the earth remains forever.
5 The sun rises, and the sun goes down,
    and hastens[c] to the place where it rises.
6 The wind blows to the south
    and goes around to the north;
around and around goes the wind,
    and on its circuits the wind returns.
7 All streams run to the sea,
    but the sea is not full;
to the place where the streams flow,
    there they flow again.
8 All things are full of weariness;
    a man cannot utter it;
the eye is not satisfied with seeing,
    nor the ear filled with hearing.
9 What has been is what will be,
    and what has been done is what will be done,
    and there is nothing new under the sun.
10 Is there a thing of which it is said,
    “See, this is new”?
It has been already
    in the ages before us.
11 There is no remembrance of former things,[d]
    nor will there be any remembrance
of later things[e] yet to be
    among those who come after.

The Vanity of Wisdom

12 I the Preacher have been king over Israel in Jerusalem. 13 And I applied my heart[f] to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven. It is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. 14 I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity[g] and a striving after wind.[h]

15 What is crooked cannot be made straight,
    and what is lacking cannot be counted.

16 I said in my heart, “I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me, and my heart has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge.” 17 And I applied my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is but a striving after wind.

18 For in much wisdom is much vexation,
    and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

I cannot post the whole book of Ecclesiastes here but so much of it points to the very depravity of so much of our earthly lives. So many of the things people treasure. So much of...human life. How we treasure books. Knowledge. Education. And how we treasure so much worse...horror movies, movies in general these days, and all other manner of sinful things. 

I say we as a human race, as in the American population. Our culture treasures all these things and more. And in the aftermath of having read that much too long, and much too un-enlightening book, I can only think I should have gone with my inner leading and left that book for someone else because it served me little purpose. I'm glad I read it because I would have kept wanting to read it had I not done so and it wasn't a bad thing to read, it's just that...it wasn't what I wanted it to be.

And in all the times I thought of how that book wasn't what I wanted it to be, as I read it out of my own expectations for what I had hoped it would be, I couldn't help thinking...wondering...how many people do that very same thing with Scripture. How many people approach Scripture thinking it's something, wanting it to be something, only to wind up disappointed in what they read within the pages of their Bibles.