How to Read your Bible - properly

How to Study the Bible and Enjoy It Chapter 1: Deciphering the Bible

The Scriptures were not given to increase our knowledge but to change our lives.—D. L. MOODY

The Bible is a truly unique and beautiful book

No book has ever been as polarising as the Bible

No book has been more life giving than the Bible

Many books have claimed to be god’s word, but none can stand on their own two feet like the Bible

I want to give you a baseline level of understanding around:

1. Why the Bible? This is really important, we have to understand God’s self-revelation

2. Bible’s reliability – Have you ever heard someone say –

“The Bible is just made up and written by men” or

“The Bible is just a fairy tale filled with myths and made up stories about some make believe sky-fairy”

or

“The bible is full of errors” – Reliability really speaks into –

The Bible is God’s word and the Bible is a reliable historical document we can trust, that documented things and people that actually existed.

3. Bible’s relatability – This really speaks into what we believe in regards to the Bible itself, how does a 2000 year old book written to an entirely different context and culture facing entirely different problems still relate to my life today?

4. Bible’s value – In light of the above, so what? I want to encourage us to see just how precious the Bible is as God’s word and encourage us to hold it in its highest regard

Start with Psalm 119 – Psalm 119 is a love poem, it is the longest love poem in the Bible

It is a love poem that isn’t about marriage or children or food or drink

It is a love poem about Gods word

Did you know Psalm 119 is 176 verses long and 169 of these verses, the psalmist makes some reference to word of God, statues, testimonies, precepts, commands

Psalm 119 is a long, intricate poem written out of adoration for God’s revelation in written form

My goal today is this: I want to give you a confidence that the Bible is reliable, that it is relatable and that it is precious. I want us to echo with joy the psalmist:

Psalm 119:167

167 My soul keeps your testimonies;

I love them exceedingly

But not just by blind faith, there are some things we can understand and believe about Scripture that can help nurture this same desire

That’s my goal today:

Why the Bible?

Doctrine of revelation – God’s self-revelation

Difference between worldy revelation and divine revelation

- Recently I was watching a show where these two ladies do wardrobe makeovers for people

- They did an episode with a fashion designer and the revamped her wardrobe and the “reveal” was shocking and exciting

- And then in a later episode they visit her and her wardrobe is a mess again

- The big shocking reveal moment – didn’t change anything

Divine revelation isn’t like that – When God reveals His divine reality to us, real transformation takes place in our innermost being, when we truly know the things of God, we will be changed, body, soul and spirit

When we are praying to encounter the presence of God, what we are really believing for is for God to open our eyes to His divine character and reality, who he is like and what his kingdom is like to be revealed to us in a deeper way or a fresh way –

When we are praying we are asking God the Spirit to reveal the glory of God the father through the Son Jesus Christ

When we have a revelation like that – lasting change is brought about in our lives Divine Revelation brings about true change

When we speak of revelation, we are speaking about how God moves and acts to make himself known to us –

the fact that God did not leave us in the dark to guess, but uncovering or unveiling himself so that we could know him and live in relationship with him

Because the simple fact is –

we could not know God at all if God did not first choose to self-reveal, but it doesn’t just stop there God doesn’t just reveal himself in an abstract way that we need to decipher – rather he makes accommodations for us

You and I are creatures who learn through our senses, through materiality, and we dwell in history – in time and space. So God reveals himself to us in history and materiality

Adam and Eve in the garden

Moses and the burning bush

Israel and the temple cloud/presence

Ultimately – fully in the incarnation

True knowledge of God is available to us, not because we are good knowers or because we are smart enough to figure it out, but rather because God is a good God, who wants us to know him

Why?

Because relationship requires that we know, revelation really gets pulled back to the gracious love of God towards us

How does that answer the question of why the bible?

Quick summary – We know that we couldn’t not know God if he did not reveal himself to us

Well he has, in two ways

1. Generally

2. Specifically

To the nation of Israel – which we see in Israels scriptures

Fully in the incarnation of Jesus Christ

And for us now the Bible which tells us of God’s revelation of himself in Israel’s history and records the life and ministry of Jesus that reveals who God is and what God is like for us to know him and be able to come into relationship with him

The Bible is not just a book – it is God’s revelation of himself to us now – that is WHY it is important.

How to Read it - practically keep these three things in mind

Read it in community - The Bible can say whatever I want it to say - this is how we get heresey

The Bible is a story - that points to Jesus

Carve out time - intentionality

SOAP - practically

What Bible to read?

The Holy Spirit is our helper - Scripture talks multiple times -

It is always easier to understand what the Bible says than to understand what somebody thinks it meant to say.—vance havner

Heitzig, S. (2002). How to Study the Bible and Enjoy It (p. 69). Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale.