Bible remains true compass – despite our culture

‘Is this a real compass?”

The boy handed me his Bible. It was dressed in a new camouflage book cover with a toy compass hanging from its zipper.

He was rightly proud of his “army man” Bible, and I was proud of him. As I knelt to inspect the compass, I was also struck by the deeper meaning of my young friend’s question: Is this a real compass?

Are the sacred Scriptures a reliable guide for daily living? Can we count on God’s wisdom, as recorded in the Bible, to point us in the right direction? Is the Bible still a real compass?

Sadly, we live in a culture that devalues the word of God.

Efforts to rid the public square of Ten Commandments displays are now commonplace. In public schools, the Bible is taught as nothing more than literature, if it is acknowledged at all.

But it is a recent decision by the Colorado Supreme Court that lately has my dander up. And it is that court’s March 28 decision that paints a tragic-but-true picture of how the culture at large really views Scripture.

Colorado’s highest court tossed out a death sentence for a rapist and murderer because jurors consulted the Bible in reaching their verdict.

Robert Harlan kidnapped a waitress. He raped her. Then he killed her as she flagged down a passing motorist, according to The New York Times. That motorist who tried to help the woman was shot by Harlan and remains paralyzed today.

After convicting Harlan, jurors were sent away by the judge to decide whether the death penalty was appropriate in the case.

Not one of us would want to be in those jurors’ shoes. It is a fearful thing to decide whether justice demands death.

The jurors did what any reasonable people would do: They did some soul searching. They prayed. They consulted the deepest moral bearings of their personal beliefs and traditions.

To their credit, jurors served their community in the exact manner the judge had asked them to; they made an “individual moral assessment” in deliberating Harlan’s proper punishment. Many jurors consulted the Bible for wisdom. Then they voted unanimously for a death sentence.

On appeal to the state Supreme Court, Harlan found his escape in America’s vain disregard for God’s word.

The court decreed in a 3-2 decision that the Bible constitutes an “improper outside influence” and a reliance on a higher authority.

“Jurors must deliberate… without the aid or distraction of extraneous texts,” the majority opinion stated.

The court’s decision is not outrageous because a death sentence was reversed. Nor did it hinge on whether death is ever a proper penalty. Harlan got punished; he sits in prison now, serving a life sentence without possibility of parole.

No, the outrage is that God’s word was rejected as a moral compass. Justices took to an absurd extreme a simple rule aimed at preventing newspaper and television stories from influencing jury decisions.

The result? When society asked 12 of its members to make one of the toughest decisions anyone could face, their Bible was declared an extraneous text. The very foundation of their values – God’s word – was deemed an improper outside influence. It’s unthinkable.

Or is it? It is easy sometimes to point fingers and shake our heads in disapproval. So often there is but a thin line between piety and prejudice.

What really tugs at my conscience lately is that this outrageous court decision mirrors a much more meaningful decision made in the hearts of individuals, even within the church.

So often we have difficulty making decisions about what is right and wrong because we have neglected the only absolute standard of truth. We waffle in decision-making because we fail to consult the infallible counsel of God’s word. How soon we forget what the psalmist sang: “Your decrees please me; they give me wise advice” (Psalm 119:24 – NLT).

The Bible itself warns us that it will be rejected as man’s depravity deepens. The apostle Paul warned Timothy to beware of this trend toward moral relativity: “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine … and will turn their ears away from the truth” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

I took my young friend’s Bible and examined the toy compass. I faced a few directions – first north, then south, then east. Happily, the compass worked just fine. It was dead-on in its accuracy. And I told him so.

I pray that Christians will uphold the Bible for what it truly is: the inspired word of God, living, faithful, always reliable in its counsel.

Let us search it daily, allow it to guide us, and then declare with our lives: Yes, it certainly is a real compass.