Studying God's Word

Series: Signs of Belonging
George J. Saylor
April 20, 2008

A collector of rare books was talking with a man who told him he had just thrown away an old Bible that he found in a dusty, old box. He happened to mention that “Guten-somebody-or-other” had printed it.
"Not Gutenberg?" gasped the collector.
"Yes, that was it!"
"You fool! You've thrown away one of the first books ever printed. Depending on the condition that book could have been worth millions!"
"Oh, I don't think this book would have been worth much," replied the man. "Some guy named Martin Luther wrote all over it.”

Not many people are bible scholars, but most of us would know enough not to throw out a Guttenburg Press bible, especially one that had been owned by Martin Luther. But as valuable as that bible would be, the real value of any bible is simply found in one thing- reading it.

So here’s the point today- I want you to read the bible. I want you to be a student of God’s word. Now if you can promise me you’ll read your bible, we can wrap this up really quick and all go golfing.

Why read the bible? In the context of our signs of belonging, we have established this- first we belong to God- he made us, he redeemed us, he loves us, he wants to us to know we are his and he is ours- we belong. And so we worship him. That’s the start. Not only do we worship him, we becomes stewards of all the has given us- we talked about stewarding our time, talents and treasures last week. Now here’s where being a student of God’s word fits in- because he loves us, because we belong to him, because we are to worship him, because God wants us to be stewards, he has not left us in the dark wondering how to do all this. He has literally given us a book so that we can know the story of his love for us. SO we can know how to worship him, so we can know how to be stewards. Why read the bible? Because God loves us enough that we are not left wondering how to work all this stuff out.

One of the things someone here on any Sunday will see is that when it gets time for me to start talking, I’m always talking in and around this- the bible. In fact, when we were working on dreaming up our church this became one of our central values-

“We love biblical truth and cultural relevance.”

In fact, we believe that statement, though it is one of our values, is fundamentally flawed- for we believe that because the bible is true it is by default, culturally relevant. The bible is true and thus cannot be anything less than profoundly relevant to our world and culture. But in the eyes of the world, we recognize and understand that is not the case. Today people approach the bible with skeptisim, but most don’t even approach it at all. It is old, antiquated, irrelevant, and if anything, some believe, has done more harm than good in the world.

In fact, what we hear more often is people saying, "I don’t believe the bible is true." When I hear that I’m like, OK, that’s an easy one to fix, I have one right here, it really does exist. But that’s not what we mean when we might say I don’t believe in the bible. What people are actually saying, I think, is that because of things they’ve heard or read about the bible, they don’t think it’s a reliable source for truth and cultural relevance. But that’s far too simplistic. A lot of the bible is poetry- how can you say poetry isn’t reliable? There are hundreds of prayers in the bible. Is there a standard for prayers- people pouring their hearts to God? A lot of it is history that has been verified by outside sources and archeological study. A lot of it is simply an outline for the religious practice of Judaism. You can’t just say, I don’t believe in the bible.

All of us need to understand some things about the bible because the bible is the most influential piece of literature in our culture, and in our world. That’s a pretty grandiose statement, but it really is true. The bible is pretty much understood to be the foundational document of our culture, which is fascinating because it was not written in our culture or context. We need to read the bible if for no other reason than becoming culturally literate. We need to read it because there are things that you think are in the bible, that really aren’t, and if you going to defend the bible, you need to know what you’re talking about. Or, conversely, if you are attacking the bible, you should really get to know what’s in there so you can really rip it apart. There are some things in the bible that are truly amazing. You need to do yourself a favor, and maybe for the first time in your life, start reading this book.

Many of you already read the bible. Awesome- you’ll like this sermon because I’ll tell you what you already know and believe, and well, that always makes us feel good. Many more of you probably want to read the bible, you believe it is the word of God, you believe it contains truth and relevance for your life and faith, but you still don’t read it, because it’s hard to read, and hard to understand, and sometimes difficult to apply, and you end up feeling a lot of guilt. Notice I didn’t say you don’t read the bible because your too busy. This isn’t the time management talk, but we make time for the things that are important to us. “I’d love to go to the bathroom more frequently, but I just don’t have the time.” But I digress. Some of you don’t read the bible, don’t care to read the bible, and don’t understand why pastors make such a big deal out of reading the bible. I’m so glad you’re here, and I hope that today I can answer some of your questions about the bible, and maybe even get you to start reading it too.

Because my hope, my prayer, my hearts desire is that all of us walk out of here this morning saying wow, the bible is so relevant, so wonderful, so important to my life and growth, that I just can’t help but want to read this thing for myself. I want to make a regular and systematic practice of reading the bible, on my own, and in a small group.

What is the bible anyways?
To start, let’s get something straight about what this bible is- it’s more like a whole library of books. In fact, bible is the Greek word for Books. Its very name is plural. Anyone know how many books are in the library of the bible? Right- 66. And if you grew up Catholic, there’s even more! And the 66 books of the bible have a natural division. Anyone? Right, New Testament and the Old Testament. Now the big question, what does Testament mean? Covenant. A contract. The old covenant created a context for God to begin his plan of redemption, which is then fulfilled in the new covenant. The 66 books were written over a period of 1500 years, they start with the writings of Moses, about 1400 years BC, and come through to the most recent ones, which were written in the second half of the first century AD. The Old Testament leads up to a 400 year silence. In all, there are over 40 contributors to the bible- shepherds, priests, prophets and kings; fishermen, craftsmen, politicians, and government employees. It was written in three languages, Hebrew, Greek and King James English (actually, Aramaic). It contains History, Law, and Prophets (Here’s how to sound really smart- call it the TaNaK- Torah (law) Nviim (prophets) and the Ktuvim (writings)). Within those books are poetry, wisdom literature, and prophesy. Then there are the four gospels that tell the story of Jesus, Acts which tells of the birth of the church, and the letters which provide guidance for the church and individuals. Finally we have one Revelation into things to come.

A collection of books, spanning 1500 years, numerous authors, telling, now here’s the best part- telling one essentially seamless story about God’s work in the world, from creation, through the fall into sin, along this trajectory of redemption, leading to the birth of God own son Jesus. Jesus lives, dies for our redemption, rises from the grave, reveals himself to his followers, ascends to heaven, and sends the Holy Spirit, gives birth to the church, and promises that this movement will grow until Jesus comes back, and heaven and earth become as one.

Now I’m going to boil it down even more- what is the bible? God’s Record of the creation, the fall, redemption and consummation of the Kingdom of Heaven.

Now that we know better what the bible is, let talk about- How to read the bible. Now I have to confess something. I actually cringe when I hear people say, I’m going to read through the whole bible. Now I know some of you have done that, and more power to you, but most people don’t have the basic background knowledge, and then because it doesn’t make much sense, they don’t stick with it, and because they don’t stick with it they get discouraged, and then they feel guilty and beat themselves up and put it away and their worse off than when they started.

You may know the routine- You pick up the bible and it's super exciting at first, everything is created, the women are naked, snakes talk, sin messes up everything, there's murder, incest, it’s wild stuff. Abraham, Isaac Jacob and Joseph have amazing stories. Exodus has talking bushes and plagues and babies getting killed, not that that’s cool, but it holds our attention. Then what happens- you hit the laws. And if you make it through that you get to a giant census in Numbers, which unless you’re a statistician or accountant isn’t the most thrilling stuff. Deuteronomy backtracks, the history is picked up again, then the whole time line goes wonky, and out of left field they start throwing in poems, prayers, prophecies and even a book all about sex (now everyones like, which one is that, that’s where I’m starting.)

SO what you need to do is get yourself on a plan.

FIRST, get yourself a time. Mark 1:35 tells us this about Jesus,

Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went to a solitary place where he prayed.

Now here’s where I’m not legalistic- It doesn’t have to be the morning. Else where Jesus goes off at night. But the point is that he made the time, and made it a priority. So make the time- wake up 15 minutes earlier. Take a break at lunch. After dinner, before you cleanup the dishes, before you go to bed- I don’t care when you do it, I just want you to do it! Get yourself 10-15 minutes. If you read more, great, again, this primarily to help people get started.

Next, take your bible, and read.
Let’s say this sermon actually works, and some of you wake up early, head to Starbucks for coffee and take your bible along to read, where do you even begin. Wonderfully, the bible has a built in bible reading plan. 2 Timothy 3:16-17. tells us,

“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

The way the bible is going to actually begin then teaching, rebuking, correcting and training us for every good work is through regular, systematic study. As you read ask yourself: what is this teaching me? IS this rebuking me? How can this correct me? How is this training me? And as you do this you’ll find yourself equipped for every good work that God has planned for you.

Many bibles have built in reading plans. Not all of them do. So we’ve provided one for you. This is designed for someone who wants to start right from the beginning, and get the whole story of the bible in 180 days. I like it because even if you’re only 50% faithful to the plan, you can get through it in a year. Personally, I think you can set 5 days a week as a goal. Reading each day of the work week, maybe missing a day and making that up on the weekend.

Take a look at the plan. You’ll see it simply goes through the bible, giving you just a chapter or two a day. You’ll go pretty much straight through the creation, the stories Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Joshua. Then when the bible stops being chronological, this is where the plan helps. Check out “The Golden Age” days 45-46. There’s an episode in King David’s life where he commits adultery and murder and almost loses everything. Day 45 gives you the story straight up. Day 46 however, gives you the prayer that he said in light of that episode, psalm 51. It’s one of the most amazing insights into the human spirit ever recorded. And now you can read it in the context of the author’s life. That’s how cool the bible is, it gives you commentary on the history, and that’s how a reading plan can help. In the story of the Kingdoms, some of you didn’t know the people of God had a kingdom, let alone a divided kingdom. Well here you’ll bounce from the history of what was happening, to the prophets who lived during those times and what they had to say.

Stick with this plan, and you’ll get a sweep of the entire bible. And as you do you’ll find this- the creation is pretty straightforward. The fall is pretty self explanatory. The consummation is pretty mysterious, but essential to know where all life and history is going. But the story of redemption is 99% of the story.

Here are some final encouragements:
One- set the time. Make it a priority. When you mess up, just get over it and get on with it.

Two- get on a plan. This is an excellent plan to give you an overview of the whole bible. Once you’ve done that, you’ll be ready for more, and there’s lots more. You could get super ambitious and work through readings from every book of the bible. You could get super-duper ambitious and go through every word of the bible. In today’
s world there is not shortage of plans and resources to help you.

Three- get in a group. The bible ultimately is lived out in community, so we study it in community. Join a Connections group, or talk to us about starting your own.

Finally, if you do this I can make you this promise. I will. And if it doesn’t play out, come to me and talk to me and tell me, I’ll buy you lunch, because I’ve never seen anything but the following happen.

When we get into God’s word, we get close to God. And as we get closer to God his word does remarkable things in your life. You’ll be going through something, then when you read the bible, you’re going to be amazed to find out the the bible actually reads you. You wonder, "How did it know exactly what I needed to hear?" You’re going to be in a conversation with someone, and they are going to say something, or ask something, and you’re going to get the chills, because you’re going to say, "I just read something this week that might really be helpful."

It might not happen everyday, but you’ll see it happen. And you’ll be pumped. And you’ll actually tremble sometimes when you read the bible. And then you’ll probably get busy. And get distracted, because that happens to new and growing Christians a whole lot, and there’s a reason for that I’m not going to get into today. And then you’ll stop feeling so close to God and equipped by God. And you know what you need to do then,

Make the time, and get on the plan.

Do you remember ordering something in the mail as a kid? My daughter Eden has discovered some magazines for kids that have some contests going on, so she has entered into a few of these. And now every morning she is the first to want to check the mail. I love it- now I just give her the keys and she checks. She is so excited every morning at the possibility that this might be the day that her prize comes.

And I think we can get that way about God’s word. That we can wake up, or take a break, or get ready to go to bed with this excitement, that we are about to open God’s word, his revelation to us. And sometimes it’s going feel like getting a prize, it’s just going to click immediately. Other times, we’ll wait. We’ll take the truth, the story, the teaching, and we’ll store it away in our hearts, because we know the day is coming when that is going to be useful. But more and more, as we study God's word, we be equipped for every good work, and we'll be happy to do it because we know we belong to God.

A downloadable version of our Bible Reading Plan can be found at our website.

Excellent online bible reading plans can be found at
http://www.biblegateway.com/resources/readingplans/