Maybe you have a Bible sitting somewhere around the house. But you're not sure exactly what to do with it. Well, we can help with that.

Jesus tells us how to handle a Bible. And his instructions are relatively easy to follow:

1. We should listen to it.

In today's world there are so many ways to accomplish this first one. You can go to church. You can listen to a message online. You can attend a growth group or Bible study. You could begin to subscribe to a daily devotional from biblegateway.com or Bible.com. You could sign up to this daily blog and read along with us.

2. We should accept it.

Jesus honors the faith of little children, because they are trusting and accept the claims of others at face value. We can do the same with the Bible. It's easy to be skeptical in today's world. But Jesus says that we can take the Bible at face value. It is what it says it is: the word of God. It has a lot of wisdom in it. It's useful wisdom for this life. And it's eternally-saving wisdom.

3. We should produce based on the Bible's wisdom.

Faith will make us more productive people. Even better, it will make us productive in all the right ways. When we read the Bible and trust it's words, we begin to produce "fruit" from the faith in Jesus that takes root in our hearts. Our words and our actions will be transformed by Jesus' love and forgiveness. And when that occurs -- who knows what might happen next?!

"Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown" (Mark 4:20, NIV).

Lord, when I open my Bible, help me to really listen to what I am reading and studying there. And then, give me trusting eyes and ears. Remove the scales of skepticism from my eyes. Finally, change me from a person who acts with a selfish heart into a person who acts with your selfless heart.

Our Bible reading for Wednesday, February 18, is Exodus 23:1 - 24:18, Mark 3:31 - 4:29 and Psalm 22:22-31.

Header image based on "The Bible" by Yarzab, CC By 2.0