The Prescription on the Nightstand

Margaret Chen sat in her doctor's office in Portland last March, listening carefully as Dr. Patel explained her diagnosis. High blood pressure — manageable, but serious if ignored. Margaret took notes. She asked thoughtful questions about sodium intake and exercise. She picked up her prescription from the pharmacy on the way home, set the bottle on her nightstand, and even downloaded an app to track her blood pressure readings.

Six weeks later, she was back in Dr. Patel's office, puzzled that nothing had improved. The doctor glanced at her chart and asked a simple question: "Have you been taking the medication?"

Margaret paused. The truth was, the bottle had sat unopened on her nightstand for forty-two days. She had read the label. She understood the dosage. She believed the medicine would work. She simply never swallowed a single pill.

"I knew everything about it," she admitted quietly. "I just never did it."

James cuts through our tendency to do exactly what Margaret did with Scripture. "Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says." The Greek word for "deceive" here — paralogizomai — means to miscalculate, to cheat yourself with false reasoning. Margaret had convinced herself that understanding was the same as obedience. Many of us sit in pews week after week, nodding at truth we never swallow. But the Word of God is not a prescription meant for the nightstand. It is medicine meant for the bloodstream.