Oddly enough, I have never owned a red-letter edition of the Bible.  (The red is for the actual words of Jesus.)  But recently when I was in Tulsa, there was a sign for a garage sale where there were tables full of books.  A minister of the gospel had died and his estate was on sale.  I bought a number of Bibles. They  were pristine, very expensive onion skin editions--on sale for three dollars each.  I must have bought a dozen or more.  If I had bought them in a store, they would have cost hundreds and hundreds of dollars.  

I gave most of them away.  But there was one that was a red-letter edition.  I kept it for myself and have really enjoyed thumbing through it and taking note of the words of Jesus that are written in red.

We discuss the words and letters of Paul, Peter, James, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John…etc.  But we don't possibly give as much attention to what Jesus said as we do to what others "said that Jesus said."  Perhaps because Jesus never wrote anything.  Everything we know about Jesus is from those who knew him.

There is a book of the gospels that has the four authors lined up in parallel.  It makes it easy to see what Matthew, Mark, Luke and John remembered. You can see the differences in what each of them thought was important.  What each of them recalled.    Their personalities show in what they chose to document.  They didn't all recall the same stories, or sayings of Christ.

In looking at the red letters today, a couple of verses caught my attention.   Matthew 6: 7-8  "But when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do.  For they think that they shall be heard for their 'much' speaking.  Don't be like them, for your Father knows what things you need before you ask him."

God just wants to hear your voice.  That's what Jesus himself said.  It is written in red.