There is a certain gospel song that should be a standard and isn't. It should be sung in churches occasionally. It's last verse sends a message we need in the present day and age. This song is entitled "Family Bible", written by Willie Nelson. In my research I couldn't find an exact date when he wrote it, but my best guess is 1959 or 1960. He and his family were living in Houston, Texas. Times were hard and lean for the struggling musician and song writer especially since he had wife and children to care for. He sold "Family Bible" for $50 to Paul Buskirk who operated a guitar school where Willie moonlighted as a teacher. Claud Gray sang it into the top 10 in 1960; however, it didn't have Willie listed as it's author. No matter, Willie was as happy as a pig in a mud puddle. Over time, fortunately, Willie came to get the credit he deserved for authoring the song.
The first lines, "There's a family Bible on the table/Its pages worn and hard to read" indicate the family Bible was handled and read regularly. This song is autobiographical. Willie and his sister, Bobbie Lee, were raised in Abbott, Texas by their paternal grandparents. I think it would be safe to assume the Bible referred to is the Nelson family Bible. Willie was born in 1933, thus growing up in the mid to late 1930s and the 1940s. It was a time when Bibles, whether family or one's personal own, could be readily found on a table, in plain sight, and were read from. Mothers could be heard singing hymns as they went about their housework, thus teaching them to their children. Going to church was a family affair. Speaking of families, the make-up of the families then was different than now. While divorce and illegitimacy occured, they weren't as prevalent and 'in our face' as now. There aren't just as many family bibles, even personal bibles, around whose pages are tattered and hard to read, which is a pity.
"At the end of day when work was over/And when the evening meal was done/Dad would read to us from the family Bible/And we'd count our many blessings one by one" is the beginning of the second verse. How different this ol' world would be if more Dads, and moms if there is no dad, not even a step-dad, in the home, were to take time after the evening meal, after the table is cleared, to read from God's Holy Word with the family gathered around the table. First off, the family needs to get back to eating supper together around a table. Everyone is on a schedule, even the children. There are athletic and other extra-curricular activities which require practices and later the events that demonstrates one's ability, alone or with a team. A friend's house that must be visited. A phone call that just has to be made. The 'net must be logged onto. Late workdays, meetings, a movie or t.v. show that just must be watched. Oh, the things we 'must' do! Supper is most and too often a quickly nuked frozen food. And when was the last time blessings were counted? We are quick to complain and find fault, even litigious over the least little offense. Time spent in those endeavors would be best spent counting the blessings we have. Look around, they are there. Many things are on a to-do list but God and His Word, in too many cases, won't be found there. Is it any wonder our families are in the state they are in? In too many places it is forbidden to speak of God, forbidden to speak of and from His Word, and God isn't even allowed in schools. That's a laugh. He's there, they just refuse to acknowledge him. Look around at the headlines and what is coming out of t.v. and radio. Children should be listening to music that honors God, not that which breaks his heart. The music they should listen to and sing along with should be about praising God, thanking him for the gift of Calvary, about going to home to heaven and salvation, not about sex, killing, drugs, debasing women and children, disrespecting authority with its foul language and violent and vulgar content. Is it any wonder our children aren't any better than we think they should be? God's instruction is made plain in Proverbs 22:6 - "Train up a child in a way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it. "
The last verse is the clincher. "Now this old world of ours is full of trouble/This old world would oh so better be/If we found more Bibles on the table/And mothers singing "Rock of Ages, cleft for me" It is as true now as when Willie wrote it, though most of the troubles came after he wrote it. In 1960 this country was at the top of a downward spiral. During that decade there was the Vietnam War, the Cold War and its dangerous possiblities, the Cuban Missle Crisis, President Kennedy's assassination, the Civil Rights Movement of the negroes, the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, the war protests, the 'free love' concept, escalated drug use, guys had hair just as, if not, longer than the gals, the rock n' roll Elvis created was getting metallic, there was a British invasion unlike the one in the 1700s, hemlines went way up, clothing seemed more like an option than a necessity, and on and on, but the sum of it is, the ol' world of the 1960s was full of trouble. Today's ol' world is in a heap more trouble because of the loosened morals of the 1960s that got even looser in the 1970s as well as because of ever changing political views and global strife which we were often quick to try and relieve. It was in the 1960s Madeline Murray O'Hare was successful in having God kicked out school, taking prayer with him. The Vietnam War demoralized this country. Our soldiers were as much victims as the Vietnamese people. Our soldiers were frustrated, subsequently corrupted, losing all sense of morality, no longer fearing consequences, and forgetting how precious life is all because they were in a war they didn't understand and wanted no part of. On account of all that, the Vietnamese people were affronted, debauched, and insulted. God only knows the actual truth of what crimes were committed there and just what both sides suffered. The point is, there was no longer honor in serving this country, no longer were the men and women serving this country supported by those they fought for. In the 1970s the highest office in the land was a vicitm of it's inhabitant's misdeeds. It was no longer an office of honor and became one the people scorned. There was the women's liberation movement. Bras were burned and equal rights demanded. When the mothers entered the work place and even began climbing the career ladder, the home suffered. Economics also played a big part in mothers going to work and also because, in many cases, father's not in the home for one reason or another refused to accept their responsibility regarding their children. Terrorism, as we know it, was a baby in the 1960s, a baby who went quickly from crawling to taking baby steps in the 1970s. Recent memory spanning from the 1980s until current time reminds us of just how well that baby learned and grew into the monster it is because it wasn't dealt with early on like it should have been. Our precious freedoms and civil liberties have actually worked against us in that we can't tighten them up or alter them one bit without great protest, even though it will mean a more secure enviroment for us. Downward and downward this country has spirialed into political and moral decay until now we wonder just what went wrong. We can't turn back the clock and relive the 1960s and 1970s to get them right, but we can learn from those mistakes by recognizing them and daring to correct them. God and prayer have a place in school. Mothers should be encouraged to stay at home. Bibles need to be out and at the ready not on a shelf gathering dust. If a home is without a bible, then one needs to be bought. Families, whether two parent or not, need to find a truly God loving, Bible believing, church. A church whose official Bible version is the King James, a church where the preacher doesn't sugar coat God's Holy Word to make it palitable and thus preaches from God's Holy Word as it is written and as the Lord leads him, a church whose preacher isn't afraid to preach on sin and hell and judgement, a preacher who preaches of the gospel of salvation, a preacher who is more concerned with what God thinks of him as opposed to what man thinks of him, a church whose preacher is far from 'PC' but rather is close to what's biblically correct (BC), a church that has a Sunday School Program, a Youth Department and other children's programs where our future can learn of God and his Word and be encourage to seek his plan for them, a church which has missionaries it sponsors and has even possibly sent out, a church that is God honoring and not one that not is man honoring. This country is nearing the end of the downward spiral. It can't be stopped but can be slowed, perhaps reversed, if this country and it's people moved closer to heaven and further from hell, closer to God and further from the devil. This could be accomplished if there were more family bibles, tattered and hard read, on the tables in the homes of America.
WANTED:
Family Bibles on tables,
opened and read from,
where God will be sought
and there he will be found;
where his Word is studied,
his teachings learned,
so that we all may have
a better and blessed tomorrow.
