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Please Write in Your Bible

In the front, on one of those white pages found in most Bibles, this faithful servant of the Lord had written: “I came to know Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior on Friday, September 3, 1948, in Shady Oaks Baptist Church, Route 3, Brookhaven, Mississippi. I was baptized the next Sunday afternoon in Shady Pond, and I have been serving the Lord all the years since.” (This is not what it said, but close enough for our purposes here.)

I read that in the service. It was more comforting than anything I had to say.

Ever since that moment, I’ve been urging people to “write your testimony in your Bible.” It will outlive you. It will be there to bless your descendants who will one day treasure your Bible.

After my father-in-law died and we were going through his house, making decisions on what to keep, what to pass on to family and what to toss, I found a Bible I had more-or-less given him in 1964. (I’m smiling at the memory.)

Pop had become enamored of the notes in my Scofield Bible, which I had purchased at a discount at the local Baptist Book Store because of a defect. (Some Scripture portion had been printed twice.)  One day when Margaret and I were newly married, Pop said, “Joe, would you give me this Bible?” So, I did.

And now, 40 years later, in a bookcase, here was that Bible. It had been repaired with duct tape. And inside was a page of notes in Pop’s handwriting. But not what I might have wished or expected.

He had listed every gun he owned with its serial numbers and history.

I suppose they were his treasures and what better place to store them than in the Holy Book.

Grandma also kept clippings in her Bible, some of which I am just now discovering. Like the 1980 article in the Jasper, Alabama, Daily Mountain Eagle where the columnist had interviewed her about her early life. There’s a lovely photo of Grandma surrounded by her five sons and seven daughters. They’re all there, and decked out in their finest. It’s a wonderful keepsake. (And for those who read our Facebook postings, right in the middle sits my Uncle Ed. The famous and notorious Edwyn McKeever, he of the malaprop, married to Opal, truly one of a kind.)

I write in my Bibles. Each of my eight grandchildren has received a Bible from me, and possibly will be given more (since I still have six or eight Bibles in my study at the house). More than once, I have read the Bible through in a year and marked it up as I went, then presented it to a grandchild. Once, I bought identical Bibles and marked up two in one year, then presented them to twins Abby and Erin.

So, please. Write in your Bible.

Start with a) your name in the front of your Bible, and then b) your testimony on one of the white pages. Then, read it with a highlighter or a fine-point pen handy. Make notes in the margin.

Make this a keepsake.

You may end up blessing descendants whom you will not see until they arrive in Heaven. And wouldn’t it be great to know your testimony helped them make it there.