The Way He Reads It

My father sent me a Bible.

Not something I needed.
Not something I was looking for.

I already have a few - different translations, different seasons of my life marked in the margins of each one.

So when it arrived, I knew it wasn’t about having another.

It was about why he chose this one.

This Bible uses the names Yahweh and Yahshua.

And tucked inside was a note.

He told me how he studies.
How he highlights each name.
How he marks different subjects - the way he tracks them, notices them, follows them through the pages.

It wasn’t long.
It wasn’t complicated.

Just a glimpse into how he sits with the Word.

And at the end, he wrote that he loves me.

I read it more than once.

Not because I didn’t understand it - but because there was something in it I didn’t want to rush past.

It wasn’t instruction.
It wasn’t correction.

It was sharing.

A quiet way of saying,
this is how I read it… this is how I see it… this is something that matters to me.

And I realized how meaningful that is.

Not just being given something,
but being invited into the way someone else experiences it.

The way they slow down.
The way they pay attention.
The way they return to the same pages and still find something new.

There was something steady in it.

Something practiced.
Something lived, not just believed.

I never thought about it before.
He studies the Bible the same way he once studied war.
With the same discipline.
The same intensity.
The same responsibility.

It made me realize…
he’s not just reading it.

He’s learning how to live it.

And it made me pause — not to compare, not to measure - but just to consider.

How do I read?

What do I notice?

What do I carry with me after I close it?

I opened the Bible he sent.

Not because I needed another one.

But because it was his.

Because it held the way he approaches something sacred.

And because sometimes, love looks like sharing the way you see the world
and trusting that it will be received with care.