I keep saving off Bible verses that I like and want to write about. I rarely write about them though. Sometimes I do, but not nearly as often as I write about other things.

I think there is a connection with this and painting. I have a lot of painting supplies. I rarely paint. I want to, but then I don’t. I don’t in part because I don’t want to mess it up. There isn’t a cut and paste feature on painting when you are doing it for real. Digital is another matter. But putting actual paint on an actual canvas is pretty scary sometimes. I don’t want to waste it. I don’t want to do it wrong.

Analyzing the Bible is the same. This is little me, non Bible scholar me, giving my viewpoint. Who am I to say that this section means this? Who am I to pull these different sections together and point out a connection between them?

Then I also think that I don’t want to alienate people. Not everybody likes to read about the Bible. A lot of people are turned off by religion because of religious people. Too many people have tried to cram the Bible down their throat rather than to offer it as the nourishing food that it is.

Then I see between the lines. I’m trying to talk myself out of this. And then I remember the Jewish concept of the yetzer hara. It isn’t me trying to talk me out of this. It is this force outside of me trying to masquerade as me to get me to not do this.

It sounds a bit crazy. It sounds a bit like hearing voices. It sounds a bit like arguing with myself, and we all know that is a bad sign.

But it is a real concept, and it is really useful to know. It is like having a road map to your mind and finally learning where the dead ends are. Don’t drive over here, you’ll get lost.

So I’m using it as a slingshot. I’m seeing this pushback or inertia or fear as a sign that this actually is something I should do, in fact it is something I must do.

It is kind of like aikido, or at least I think it is. At least it is what I think aikido is about. Use your opponent’s energy against him.

So I’m going to commit to making at least one of my posts a week a musing on a particular Bible verse or section. I was going to say three posts, but then I think that is the yetzer hara doing its evil magic as well. If I commit to three and then have a hard time doing it, I’m likely to give up altogether.

It is just like committing to exercise. If you start exercising and you say you’ll go to the gym every day, you’ll likely get sore and tired and worn out. You’ll get discouraged if you try too much all at once. Best to start out small and warm up to it.

I did the same thing with my blog. I committed at first to posting at least three times a week, with the hidden goal of once a day. I now post as much as four times a day, and that is partly because I’ve found “dead” time to work and how to write using my phone and my Kindle.

It is precisely because of how I’m able to write this often is why I shouldn’t commit to three posts of Bible study a week. I need to do those kinds of posts at a computer so I can cut and paste specific references. I don’t always have time to sit at a computer to do that.

Or, am I making up yet another “rule” of how I should do this? Yet another yetzer hara trick. It will tell you that if you can’t do it perfectly, don’t do it at all. The way around that one is to know that doing even a little of a good deed is better than doing nothing.

So, wish me luck, and I hope you find some good out of my insights that will follow. Pray that I am able to hear and interpret God’s Word wisely, so that we all might be uplifted.