Every year on Black Friday, people are injured in fights with fellow-consumers attempting to beat each other to the best door-crasher deals. Punches are thrown. People are trampled. Guns are drawn. And tears are sometimes shed by those who don’t get the new earbuds or smartphone or designer handbag that they so desperately felt they needed.

So when I read of primitive Dani tribespeople wiping tears from their eyes because they arrived too late to get their own copy of the Scriptures, I have to wonder if we haven’t lost something. (Read the story.) Here in the West, we believe we are the enlightened ones, priding ourselves in how far we have advanced as a society. Those who line up for days ahead to get the latest electronic gadgets can’t even fathom a people on the other side of the world who would wait patiently in line for the privilege of holding God’s written Word in their hands.

I wonder if anywhere in the West there was a run on Bibles this past Christmas. I wish I wasn’t so sure of the answer to that question. We have had the Word of God so freely and for so long that for the average North American, it has lost its allure. My wife and I have no less than a dozen copies of the Scriptures between the two of us. And if we wanted a dozen more, we certainly wouldn’t have to line up to get them — much less worry about shedding a tear if we failed.

But there’s another reason to weep over it. David says as much in Psalm 119:136: “Streams of tears flow from my eyes, for your law is not obeyed.” That there are people in this world who still cannot get their hands on a copy of the Scriptures is cause enough for tears. But that there are millions who have access to God’s Holy Word and ignore it should produce rivers of tears.

Every human being should have God’s Word. And every one who has it should cherish it. Anything less is a crying shame.