Our view of the Bible Matters

Evaluating what source we rely on

When we got the news that we were going to be shutting down for a bit we wanted to continue to help you all grow in your relationship with Jesus. This came out in a new resource every day that would help you follow Jesus during this weird time. Benjer and I had Tuesday’s. We called them truth Tuesday’s and of you were able to watch them , the whole goal of truth Tuesday was to help us to align ourselves to God. Because during this time (and all time… it’s just more evident now) there is a lot of disinformation. A lot of people who are all experts telling us different things. We took it a step back and said, what does God say? No God doesn’t say in his word, anything about what to do during Covid 19 in the year 2020 but he does show us who he is, who we are as humans and for those of you who are Christians as christians. He shows us what a people who live in the kingdom of God look like. People who are dependent on him completely.

Unfortunately, for many of us the reality quickly set in that even if we were reading our Bible’s every day we were not ultimately finding what we knew in our bones to be true in it. We were allowing the news, family, friends, disinformation campaigns to scare us into believing and trusting in other things, people and organizations.

If you are a Christian you know that the Bible is essential to the Christian life. If we don’t spend time in God’s word then we will not know God. The gospel comes straight out of his word that Jesus died for our sin’s on the cross and that he rose from the dead and defeated our shame our sin. That he took the wrath that I deserved from God for my sin. But how quickly do we being to not see the Bible as the sweet word of God but as so many other lesser, inadequate things. and then he kicker is we get board of it.

We begin to approach the Word of God not as it was intended for us to approach it.

Read 2 Tim 3:12-17

Paul is adamant that Timothy would continue in what he has learned. That he would continue to the Scriptures and that the Word of God would equip him to take his place basically. That timothy would be made complete in it.

I think a lot of our problem comes from how we view and approach the Bible. We approach it in a lot of ways in which God never intended or wants us to approach it as. The problem too with this is when we approach the Bible in an unintended way, we then blame the Bible for not “working” which a whole other problem.

Ways that we approach the Bible in our lives wrongly. We think that Scripture is....

Just like any other book and when it doesn’t draw us in anymore, we stop reading it.

66 books, 33 authors all pointing to one thing. Jesus.

Something that we only read when we feel bad about sinning.

SUBPOINT

Self Help book

SUBPOINT

Quintessential Christian Sayings.

To give us directions

When we are at a stress point in our lives or our month that’s when we go to scripture. So, If I need to know what college to go to, or what career to have or what city to live in our what person to marry. This is the point when we start searching through the scriptures to find the answers to these “key” pinch point questions in our lives.

The problem is… the Bible doesn’t tell you what college to go to. It doesn’t tell you who to marry. It doesn’t even tell you what to do next. The Bible is not a road map for your life. It’s not because the Bible actually transcends all of those moments in your life. And that is what Paul is getting at for Timothy here.

As we were going through the sermon on the Mount, the favorited pastor/theologian to quote was Martyn Lloyd Jones. During the series I started to look up some of his sermons and listen to them as we went through the series. At one point in his sermon on part of Matthew Chapter 7, he says that scripture is a manual for the soul. a manual for the soul. Not for your life on this earth but for something at is eternal, your soul. The Bible transcends this world and goes beyond it. The Bible is always concerned about your soul and it’s relationship to God more than anything else because that dictates everything about you.

POSSIBLE OMISSION : When we do this to God’s word it’s like if you went to a nice restaurant and ordered a nice expensive steak and you cut the fat off and nahhed on it for a bit and didn’t eat the steak. Honestly, that Fat piece will taste good for a bit, but you are missing out on an amazing steak!!! and not only that but all the nutrients all the things you need are in the steak.

Paul shows that Scripture is...

God’s Word breathed out. That it is actually the God who created all things… Word for you.

This is a made up word from Paul. It’s not used anywhere else in his writings. But Paul is showing that the Bible has a divine origin from God not from man and it speaks to us all individually. Not that it says different things to each of us that contradict each other but that we have an ongoing relationship with God primarily through his word.

It’s to teach, reproof, correct and train me in righteousness.

The purpose of scripture is that I would engage the Holy Spirit in the process of sanctification. Of actually becoming more like Christ. That I would approach the scriptures knowing that it says things that are against what I believe and how I act but I will dictate my life, my heart around it.

If the Bible agree’s with everything you do, say, and think… then you aren’t allowing the Spirit to sanctify you in his word. The Bible will cut you.

Hebrews 4:12-13 -

12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

The word of God will exposes all of us. Exposes us for the the frauds that we are. It cuts to the depths of our soul and heart, it divides us up and reveals that we are not as good as we think we are. That we are wicked people seeking our own gain and motives.

But, It also shows us hope. That through the blood of Christ that you and men, enemies of God, can be called son’s and daughters of the most high.

Allow the Bible to cut at you. Allow the Bible to expose you and your heart, knowing that for those who are in Christ there is no condemnation because of what he has done. So, there is no fear in being exposed. Scripture exposes us so that we would not trust in ourselves but trust in Christ alone.

3. That we would be complete, equipped for every good work.

Scripture gives us a purpose, it calls us out into the world to share the gospel.

It calls us out of ourselves.

The Bible calls us to deny ourselves, pick up our cross and follow.

All of the things that scripture really is, sounds scary to us sometimes, which is why we resort to looking at it like the other things because… it’s easier. But remember what Llyod Jones said, It’s a manual for the soul. These are the things that your soul desires truly, everything else will never satisfy.

I was thinking about how to end this sermon and I thought, I don’t want people to walk away and say “I need to read my Bible more” not that that’s a bad thing but this is deeper than that. Do you see the Bible as your authority, as the thing that dictates how you act, what you do, how you think? Does it have that much weight? Do you use it as a manual for your soul?

Let me pray for us to that end.