As we finish up the OYB readings for 2014, here are verses from each reading from the last books of the Old and New Testaments and the last chapters of Psalms and Proverbs. As I’m sure others have noticed, even though the Bible is made up of sixty-six books, it has an amazing unity. Though it was written over a period of over fifteen hundred years, in three distinct languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek) on three separate continents (Africa, Asia, and Europe), by at least forty human writers from vastly differing fields, perspectives, and backgrounds, it still reads as one book. Why? Because they all wrote under the direction of the one Spirit of God.
Notice in the above four verses the unifying themes: Fear of God, praise of God, eternal life, the Lord as our light, eternal reward… Perhaps the Proverbs 31 reading seems a little out of place, until we consider that the bride is often a metaphor for the Church. Taken in this way, the Proverbs reading joins in the harmonious chorus of Christ and His Bride enjoying all of eternity together.