Pray-reading the Word of God to Inhale the Breathing out of God and Gain more of God

We need to be those pray-reading the word of God to inhale the breathing out of God and gain more of God.

As believers in Christ, we come to the Bible as the breath of God for us to breathe in that we may receive life supply from God; we read the verses in the Bible prayerfully, and this pray-reading becomes our inhaling of God’s breath. Hallelujah, all Scripture is God-breathed!

The whole Bible is the breathing out of God, and we need to simply enjoy God in His word.

When we come to the book of Proverbs, we need to be the right kind of person with the right kind of attitude, otherwise this book – which is filled with excellent nuggets and gems, full of wisdom – will become the letter of the law to kill us instead of spirit and life.

When we come to the word of God we need to lift up our hands to it by welcoming it warmly and saying Amen to God’s word.

Whether the word of God in the Bible is something that is a law to us or something that gives us life depends on our person and our attitude toward the word.

We need to open to the Lord, contact Him, and call on His name; when we exercise our spirit to contact God in coming to His word, all the words in the Bible become spirit and life.

I always wondered concerning the Old Testament Psalmists, who didn’t have the New Testament and didn’t know that God loved us so much that He sent His Son to die for us and become our life.

I wondered concerning the Psalmists and the prophets, especially those who said that they loved the law, they treasured God’s statutes, and they read God’s commandments and wanted to walk in them, for they loved God and His word.

What inspired them to write such words, what kind of person were they, and what was their attitude in coming to God’s word? Can one love the law of God?

Can one love the proverbs, many of which expose us of what we are not and what we cannot do?

It all depends on what kind of person we are and what is our attitude; if we love God, seek Him, pray, and open to Him, all the words in the Bible are sweet and nourishing to us, and we receive spirit and life.

But if we come to the word of God in a systematic way, to gain knowledge, or to find out more about what God wants from us and what we should do for God, then we will get knowledge, but we will not have much enjoyment of God, and our expression will not be God being expressed through us.

May we receive the word of God warmly and gladly, say Amen to it, and enjoy the Lord in His word!

Reading the Bible by Pray-reading the Word of God to Inhale the Breathing out of God in His Word

When we come to the Bible to contact God, we should not only exercise our eyes to read and our mind to understand what we read; even more, we need to exercise our spirit to read and pray the word of God.

The book of Proverbs is not just an excellent book full of the words of wisdom; it is the breath of God for us to breathe in so that we may receive the life supply from God.

The whole Bible is the breath of God, the breathing out of God; the Bible is what God exhales, the breathing out of God for us to breathe in (2 Tim. 3:16).

When we come to the Bible, when we come to read verses and chapters in the Bible, we need to read the word of God by means of all prayer.

When we pray and read, read and pray the word of God in the Bible, we inhale God’s breath – we breathe in God. Wow!

When we read the Bible without praying, we contact the Word of God by the old man; the result is that we may gain knowledge, but we do not gain more of God.

For us to have a genuine reading of the Bible, we need to not separate our reading from our praying God’s word.

When we come to the book of Proverbs, we should read it by inhaling the breath of God; God has breathed Himself out in His word, and we breathe God in by praying and reading His word.

Let us take the book of Proverbs as the breathing out of God through the exercise of our spirit to pray-read the word of God.

Then, when we pray and read, read and pray, the book of Proverbs, this book will become profitable to us; it will be profitable for teaching, conviction, correction, and instruction in righteousness.

Eph. 6:17-18 tells us to receive the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the Word of God, by means of all prayer and petition. How should we receive the word of God?

By means of all prayer and petition; prayer is general, petition is particular – whether general prayers of particular prayers, we need to pray over the word of God.

This practice of pray-reading the Bible is not something that we have invented; it is something that many seekers of God throughout the centuries have practiced, for they found that much life and spirit can be received when they pray-read the word of God!

It must be our habit that we prayerfully read the Bible day by day to inhale what God has breathed out.

We may come to a verse like John 3:16 and we may simply make it our prayer by telling the Lord, “Thank You God for loving me. You loved the world so much. Thank You, God, my Father, for loving me so much that You gave Your Son, even the Only Begotten, to me. I believe into You, Lord, and I have life. Amen, I have eternal life, and I shall not perish. Thank You, God!”

We can mix our prayer with the words in the Bible, and the black and white words in the Bible become Spirit and life to us.

May we have a turn in our inner being when we read the Bible, especially when we come to the book of Proverbs.

May we come to this book by pray-reading it to gain more of God. If we don’t pray-read this book, we will enjoy a collection of proverbs, we will gain more knowledge, and we may think we know what we should do, but we don’t gain Spirit and life!

All the words in Proverbs are God’s breathing, which is altogether embodied in Christ; as we read the book of Proverbs, we need to inhale all that God has exhaled, what He has breathed out.

As we inhale the divine breath in Proverbs, we will receive the breath of the speaking God, and we will enjoy Christ (2 Tim. 3:16; John 20:22).

All these proverbs, all this wisdom, all these instructions, all of them are just Christ to us when we pray-read the word of God, benefitting and supplying our inner man, and causing us to live out Christ for God’s expression.

Lord Jesus, we come to You in Your word by praying over Your word so that we may receive Spirit and life. Save us from coming to Your word in the way of gaining knowledge. May we be those who come to Christ when we come to the Bible. May we be those who breathe in the breathing out of God in His word. Hallelujah, all Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for conviction, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Amen, Lord, may Your word become Spirit and life to us as we mix it with our prayer in faith! We say Amen to Your word. We pray Your word back to You, and we mix Your word with our Amen and our prayer in faith! May the words in the Bible become Spirit and life to us as we pray-read them so that they may benefit us and supply our inner man, causing us to live out Christ for God’s expression!

Learning to Inhale the Scriptures by Receiving the Word of God by means of All Prayer to gain more of God

In the Old Testament we see that the children of Israel were charged to keep the commandments, statutes, and ordinances; today, we are charged to keep Christ (Deut. 6:1, 5-9; Phil. 3:9; 1:19-21).

What God delights in is Christ; what He desires that we enjoy and express is just Christ.

We need to take Christ, keep Christ, and hold fast to Christ so that we may gain Christ, enjoy Him, and live Him!

Our need is not merely to gain more knowledge about God and His plan for our life; we need to love Christ, keep Christ, teach Christ, wear Christ, and write Christ, having Christ as our everything and ministering Christ to others.

The best way to do this is to come to the word of God in the way of pray-reading the Bible so that we may gain more of God.

The Scriptures are the breathing out of God, the exhaling of God (2 Tim. 3:16); therefore, we should inhale the Scriptures by receiving the word of God by means of all prayer and petition (Eph. 6:17-18).

Then, when we speak to others, we will not impart mere knowledge or doctrine to them – we will exhale God into people.

When we come to the book of Proverbs, we should read it by being filled with the fullness of God in our spirit (Eph. 5:18-19; 3:19).

We need to read the book of Proverbs in the New Testament Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2), with our regenerated spirit (v. 16), and by mingling prayer with our reading (Eph. 6:17-18) in order to mingle the words with spirit and life (cf. John 6:63).

We need to learn to inhale the Scriptures by pray-reading the word of God.

In the book of Proverbs in particular we see that there are some big proverbs (like nuggets of gold) and the small ones (like gems); these, however, are not for us to build up our old man but to build up our new man!

When we come to the book of Proverbs in the way of pray-reading it, what happens is that our new man is built up, and we will be strengthened in our life of pursuing Christ for the fulfilment of God’s economy. Amen!

When we breathe in the breathed out word of God by taking in the word in a prayerful way, by means of all prayer and petition, we are infused with the element of God, and we can live a life for the fulfilment of God’s purpose.

It is by praying and reading, reading and praying, the word of God that we can live a life for the building up of the Body of Christ, which consummates the New Jerusalem as God’s heart’s desire and ultimate goal. Amen!

Then, we will pursue Christ more, we will pray-read more, and we will be stirred up, inspired, strengthened, and supplied to pursue Christ even more! Hallelujah!

May we all learn to inhale the Scriptures by receiving the word of God by means of all prayers, and may we practice speaking the word of God to others in the way of exhaling God into them.

This will strengthen our pursuit of Christ and will cause us to love Him more and build up the church as the Body of Christ.

Lord Jesus, we want to learn to inhale the Scriptures by receiving the word of God by means of all prayer and petition. Fill us with Yourself, Lord, as we read and pray, pray and read, Your word. Fill us to overflowing with Your very element, with Spirit and life, until we exhale God into people by speaking the word of God into them. Amen, Lord Jesus, may all the words in the Bible benefit us for our pursuit of Christ and the building up of the church as the Body of Christ. Make us those who pray-read the word of God so that we may be strengthened, stirred up, inspired, and supplied to pursue Christ more for the building up of the church. Amen, Lord Jesus, we give ourselves to You to pray-read the Word of God and thus inhale God in His word!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Proverbs, msg. 8, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-study of Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes (2020 winter training), week 9, Reading the Book of Proverbs with a Praying Spirit So That It Will Render Us Nuggets and Gems to Strengthen Our Life of Pursuing Christ for the Fulfillment of God’s Economy.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – When we the Word in spirit touch, / As life the Spirit it becomes; / The Spirit, when expressed from us, / As words of life to others comes. (Hymns #815)
  – All Scripture is God-breathed / And profitable for teaching, / For reproof, for correction, / For instruction in righteousness, / That the man of God may be complete, / Fully equipped for every good work. (Scripture song)
  – All Scripture is the very breath of God, / And by His Spirit into words was breathed; / By godly men the words were written down, / With all God’s fulness unto man bequeathed. / It is the breath of God for us to breathe, / That as our portion God we may enjoy; / Receiving it by spirits exercised, / Our need is met, His wealth we may employ. (Hymns #799)