Real Estate, Reality, and the Case of the Boring Book

     I love to read as much as the next person, but it has to be a pretty impressive piece of workmanship to grab my attention and pull me back to its pages more than once.  There are a select few books that I am proud to say are 'my favorites'.  So now I'd like to tell you a short story.

Put-you-in-a-trance Literature

The only book store in town where you find 

the books that sympathize with your situation

     Traci gazed at the sign briefly and smiled.  An intriguing name!  She walked inside and surveyed the atmosphere.  With shelves as high as the ceiling and comfy chairs throughout, the store was as inviting as her own bed after a long day.  Another sign inside the door with the day's special sales shouted at her in bold letters "Selling the best literature the world has to offer!"  Behind the counter a clerk smiled superficially through only her teeth. "How can I help you?"  She asked.  Traci answered that she was only looking around, then walked into the nearest aisle.  As she flipped through the books, she came across one that really jumped out at her.  Pulling it off the shelf, she inspected the back.  It was authored by...uh-oh.  Dad said I couldn't read these books, Traci remembered.  He says they're not worth anything; that they're full of junk.  But this one is that teen romance novel that everyone's talking about!  Maybe if I read just a little bit...

     That is what our culture does.  Millions of authors cheaply auction off their junky volumes to unsuspecting kids, like a real estate property sold that looked beautiful on the outside but on the inside contained mold and a rotted foundation, frame, and roof.  And those books carry children and adults alike into an unrealistic world of artificial love, no responsibility, and a skewed view of life.  This leads to children growing up expecting life to be everything that it isn't, and adults living in a childlike trance that they thought was reality.  And because the books that they read present our existence as everything but reality, they provide a false sense of security in worldly love, lusts, and pleasures.

"Books show us the world, and in that sense, too many books for adolescents

act like funhouse mirrors, reflecting hideously distorted portrayals of life."

-Meghan Cox Gurdon, children's book reviewer for the Wall Street Journal

     This woman is exactly right.  And the the devil is constantly trying to produce temptations that look godly so as to deceive us!  But we must always remember 1 John 2:16-17: "For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.  And the world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God abides forever."  So when selecting our reading material, we should take care that it lines up with the statutes of the Scriptures that the Father has so graciously placed into our very hands.

     So do godly books have to be so boring, you might ask?  Absolutely not!  I admit there are some very ho-hum Christian books out there, but there are so many more great ones! For some good suggestions, visit my sister Haley's blog, Pure Reflections, and read her posts under the label "Books".

"But have nothing to do with worldly fables fit only for old women.  On the

other hand, discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness; for bodily discipline

is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds

promise for the present life and also for the life to come."

1 Timothy 4:7-8

     Saturating ourselves in the Word of God will not only profit us in this life; it holds promise for eternity!