Electronic Bibles

I recently heard a pastor talking about people using their phones as their bibles.  It grabbed my attention as this has been something that I have wrestled with myself.  I do use a bible app on my phone for certain circumstances...quick reference, easier to bring to something like a conference, etc.  However, I have been bothered that this has been embraced by many as the main source of bible reading.  This brought me to listen closely as the pastor talked about why he thought that the written bible, as a book, could not be replaced and should still be sought as a means of reading and studying God's Word.  In, mostly, his words...

"Down with fake bibles..."--why we should not use our phones as our bibles:

• It's not personalized
• You can mark up the text on your phone and possibly even take notes but it is not personal
• Marking the text in your phone is not the same as your handwriting--recording what God is teaching you around the text
• It's not broadly visible
• Cheating yourself out of context--difficulty cross referencing
• Can easily lead to false interpretation--not seeing it all fit together
• It's not special
• You use your phone for multiple purposes (playing games, checking email, social media, funny GIFs, etc.)
• A bible has one purpose--a special purpose
• It's not observable
• When you read your bible...people know what you are doing; this gives a message to those around you
• When you are on your phone...people are not sure what you are doing
• It's not inconvenient
• Our phones are convenient
• The bible is not convenient...you must carry it around and that is a chore, compared to carrying your phone
• These things (inconveniences to using your bible) tell our soul that "this (the bible)" matters

With all of this to say, I have a little "meat" to what has bothered me about using my bible app too much to replace my actual bible.  I don't believe it is wrong to use bible apps but I do believe that using our phones as bibles can alter our view of God's Word and affects those around us as we are witnesses to them.  

In a time when we know that God's Word is becoming more and more watered down and we are more prone to wander towards the things of this world, I believe it is even more important to value and pursue God's Word and treat it for what it is..."sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart".  There is NOTHING like it.  Keep it sacred, to stand apart from the world around you.