Before you knew how to read, you knew how to listen. The first words that you understood were not on a page but on the lips of your mother. And I think this is why the messages that impact us most powerfully are spoken rather than written. In 1999, our family left South Africa in a brand new Land Rover stuffed with luggage.

Our destination was Mozambique and our goal the fulfillment of a call to translate the Bible for the Nyungwe people. But first we had to pass through Zimbabwe. At that time, Harare, the capital, was something like the promised land for us. The streets were lined with flowering trees. The guesthouses were comfortable and inexpensive. We could eat in Italian bakeries, English teahouses and steakhouses. And the best part was that Harare was only about four hours from where we would be living in Tete. Whereas Harare was a garden of earthly delights, the city of Tete was hot and dusty, and the streets were lined with piles of garbage.

On the day before the day, the day when we would arrive in Tete and begin our new life as missionaries, we were cruising through Harare on our way to a guesthouse. We had just left the Italian bakery. I remember so clearly sitting on the steps in the sunshine with my three small children wiggling and spinning, their faces and fingers still sticky from the treats. How good life is, I thought. As we drove down a tree lined boulevard dappled with sunlight and shade, Rod Stewart was on the radio singing, “Have I told you lately that I love you.”

The day was growing late. The sun had set. We arrived at what we thought was the guesthouse but couldn’t get anyone from behind the high gate to answer. We kept banging on the gate and finally someone did open the gate. We drove into the compound and started to pile out of the vehicle and gather our things to spend the night. But someone else had also driven into the compound. Four young men surrounded us. Two of them had guns. They wanted money, anything of value. Before they had finished they had robbed us of a thousand dollars,  my Gideon Bible and the illusion that Harare would always be our personal playground.

I was calm during the crime, but suffered terrors for weeks after. Perhaps that calm is the same felt by a mouse trapped under the cat’s paw. Later, in our house in Tete, I jumped at sounds in the night. And all the desperate cries for help in the Psalms became my cries as well. Several weeks later, we gathered with other missionaries on a Sunday night for fellowship. I was asked to share about the robbery and I began by reading Psalm 116:1-4.

I love you, Lord!
    You answered my prayers.
You paid attention to me,
    and so I will pray to you
as long as I live.
Death attacked from all sides,
    and I was captured
by its painful chains.
But when I was really hurting,
I prayed and said,
    “Lord,
please don’t let me die!”

When I read the words, “Please don’t let me die!” I got choked up in that way men do when they’re trying not to cry. Speaking the words of Psalm 116 had transformed them from the Psalmist’s prayer into my prayer.

Many times since then I’ve noticed that something powerful happens when I read the Bible aloud. Why is it that the Word of God speaks to me more powerfully when I speak it to others? The spiritual discipline of hiding myself in my room and silently reading the Scriptures is often unfruitful. It might have something to do with the number of senses involved. When I read out loud my voice, my ears and my eyes are all involved. When I read, it is just my eyes moving over the page.

So, I guess this is just a round-about way of encouraging you to read the Bible out loud. There’s nothing wrong with reading the good Book silently or listening to it on your mp3 player. But, you might try reading the Bible out loud as well. Every morning after breakfast I read a passage of the Bible to my children. Invariably I will notice things that I missed earlier in the morning when I was just reading to myself. And reading the Bible with others reinforces our connectedness as children of God. It’s interesting that in Koine Greek there is no way to say, “read out loud.” It was simply assumed that if someone was reading, they were reading by speaking the words. That’s why when Philip approaches the Ethiopian eunuch it says, “He heard him reading” (Acts 8:30). And when translators render the Greek of 1 Timothy 4:13, they invariably have to add two pieces of information. The Greek is literally, “Attend to the reading.” But almost every English translation says, “Attend to the public reading of Scripture.” That’s because it was assumed that reading was done out loud and in community. When Benedict developed the concept of lectio divina, as a means of solitary contemplation of the Scriptures, he did so in the context of a community that had withdrawn from the world. I practice lectio divina, and I think it’s a very good thing. But it must be balanced by lectio synagoga, our reading of the Scripture in community.

Before I publish posts on my blog, I almost always try to read them out loud. Because when I do I discover things that need changing even though I’ve already read it several times. Reading aloud is powerful.

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Note: Apologies to students of Latin for my neologism: lectio synagoga. Maybe someone can suggest a better term.