“In reading and studying the holy Scripture, we ought with all diligence to search and attend unto, as did the prophets of old (1 Peter 1:11-12), if we intend by them to be made ‘wise unto salvation.’ We should herein be as the merchant-man that seeks for pearls; he seeks for all sorts of them, but when he hath found one of ‘great price,’ he parts with all to make it his own (Matthew 13:45-46).
The Scripture is the field, the place, the mine where we search and dig for pearls. (See Proverbs 2:1-5). Every sacred truth that is made effectual unto the good of our souls, is a pearl whereby we are enriched; but when we meet with, when we fall upon this pearl of price, the glory of Christ,– this is that which the soul of a believer cleaves unto with joy.
Then do we find food for souls in the word of truth, then do we taste how gracious the Lord is therein, then is the Scripture full of refreshment unto us as a spring of living water,– when we are taken into blessed views of the glory of Christ therein. And we are in the best frame of duty, when the principal motive in our minds to contend earnestly for retaining the possession of the Scripture against all that would deprive us of it, or discourage us from a daily diligent search into it, is this,– that they would take from us the only glass wherein we may behold the glory of Christ.
This is the glory of the Scripture, that it is the great, yea, the only, outward means of representing unto us the glory of Christ; and He is the sun in the firmament of it, which only hath light in itself, and communicates it unto all other things besides.”
-–John Owen, “Meditations and Discourses Concerning the Glory of Christ” in The Works of John Owen, ed. William Goold, (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1965), Vol. I: p. 316.
