“Book Burning”

March 20

Read: Acts 19:11-20; Focus 18-20

Book Burning

I remember the night like it was yesterday. I was 18. I lived in a cabin with 8 other guys in the mountains of Colorado. This was during the days of CD’s… you know… Compact Discs. This was how you listened to music in my high school and college years. Somewhere in that time after you first go to bed and fully fall asleep the Lord spoke to me. He told me it was time for them to go. The Lord was hitting me where it hurt… my music. It was a guilty pleasure. The message and content of my music. So I sat up in my bed and told the guys in my room… “I need to get up, I have to do something.” I am not sure where the idea came from, but I got up right then and there and emptied my case of those CD’s that I knew were not edifying or beneficial (which was most of them). What did I do next? Well, I smashed them with a hammer! I entertained the idea of just throwing them away… but that didn’t seem like enough. I thought about selling them… but then I would be profiting from someone else consuming the media. So I smashed them. A lot of them. I mean… maybe 100 of them. What a mess! After the moment passed I realized what a pain it was going to be to clean this all up! Ha! I vacuumed for a solid hour afterwards cleaning up the shards. In that moment I felt a real freedom from something I knew had been holding me back. It was a step of obedience before the Lord.

If physical things can carry spiritual weight (see yesterday’s devo.) then they can carry negative weight as well. If scraps of cloth can somehow transfer the goodness of God, so also can these negative items give a foothold or pathway for the enemy of The Lord. We see this in the people of God here in Acts:

“Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.” (Acts 19:18-20)

As the people of God, we must “confess and divulge” our practices to one another. We need to be willing to “burn our books” so to speak. There are tokens, reminders, and tools that bring us down a path we should not go. These are things that enable us and open the doors for the enemy to wreak havoc in our lives. For some of you, it may mean destroying that thing - not just giving it away to someone else or trashing it. There are many times where God has had his people dismantle and breakdown idols and those things that lead astray. (cf. Judges 6:28-, Gen. 11:1-) What do you need to :confess and divulge”? What do you need to “toss in the fire”? What “CD’s do you need to smash”? Is this process worth it?

It is funny that they mention the value of the books. Do you realize how much 50,000 pieces of silver is worth! Jesus was betrayed for 30 pieces of silver! Those coins, in today's money, have at least $15 worth of silver in them… so that would be $750,000.00! But actually, a silver denarii is a day's wage. So this would be 50,000 days wages. That would represent 5 millions dollars worth! Whoa. Imagine how many animals you could buy! Imagine the proverbial “good” you could do with that money! Was it worth it? The answer is a resounding “yes”! You cannot place a price on freedom and life in Christ. The alternative is only death.

What if breaking free from the vices that bring evil and death into your house and life is going to cost you some $? What if it costs you a substantial amount? Is it worth it? Would you let go if something… hand it over… “burn it”… even if it cost you? These type of refining moments rarely happen alone. We normally do not have the strength ourselves. I needed my brothers that night in the cabin… before I talked myself out of it and continued to hold on to my guilty pleasure. These people burned their books together. They also did it publicly! No turning back! Talk about accountability. Once we are publicly open about our faith and transparent about our life… it is much more difficult to turn back. We need one another to encourage each other and to make the bold moves that will move us deeper into relationship with Christ and set us free from those things which usher in evil spirits, the enemy, sin, and death. May we be granted courage by Jesus to “confess and divulge”. May we be spurred on enough to “burn our books”… even if it costs us some $ or pleasure. May we trust that God is powerful enough to replace and restore anything that we lose in the process. I have never missed those CD’s… not once. I found GOOD music that brought me as much enjoyment as anything that I smashed. I went to bed a more free man that night… alive in CHRIST. (cf. Gal. 2:20) Love you guys… “burn those books” - JDP