Understanding the Bible

Sermon for North Hill Adventist Fellowship 9/15/2012

Text; John 6:33. The Spirit alone gives eternal life. Human effort accomplishes nothing. And the very words I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

This is a revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants the events that must soon take place. He sent an angel to present this revelation to his servant John, who faithfully reported everything he saw. This is his report of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. God blesses the one who reads the words of this prophecy to the church, and he blesses all who listen to its message and obey what it says, for the time is near. Revelation 1:1-3

Depending on who you talk to the Bible is the best book in the world or it is the most dangerous book in the world.

For Christians, it is the Word of God. It is God's mind made available to humanity. It is a source of life, hope, and wisdom.

On the other hand, it has also been seen as the most dangerous of all books. During the last century, the Bible was one of the greatest threats to Communism. It was outlawed in China and in the Soviet Union (for my younger readers, that's the Communist nation that was dominated by Russia.)

Even in so-called Christian Europe, 500 years ago people were executed for translating the Bible into English. The book was too dangerous to allow ordinary people read it. In the last 50 years, some Christians again fought to keep the Bible away from ordinary people. They argued that the King James Version, a translation into old English published in 1611, was the last, definitive revelation of God, replacing the original Greek and Hebrew manuscripts. They vigorously opposed the translation of the Bible into the language of ordinary people. But they couldn't stop it. And today we Bible translations of all sorts for every kind of reader.

So how do we get the most benefit out of a book, parts of which are perhaps 3000 years old, and the most recent section of which is 2000 years old?

Several of you have asked for sermons on how to understand the Bible. So that is what we are going to examine today.

[Note: In this sermon, I will ignore completely the problem of contradictory interpretations. Sometimes people using identical formal approaches to interpreting the Bible espouse mutually exclusive interpretations. I know of no rational method for resolving these disputes. What I offer here is a guide for using the Bible for the cultivation of saintliness not the resolution of ideological/doctrinal disputes.]

Rule number one: Read the book. All the other rules I mention come in no particular order of importance. They all have a place in understanding the Bible but the order in which I list them is unimportant. However, this rule is truly number one. It is vastly more important than all other rules. None of the other rules even matter until after you have completed rule number one. READ THE BOOK.

Brian gave up Christianity in his early teen years because his father died in spite of his prayers. He became a Buddhist in college. In his thirties we met and began visiting. When he said something that agreed with something Jesus said, I would point it out. “That reminds me . . . ” I'd say, and then I would quote the passage in the New Testament that Brian's comment reminded me of.

Some months into our friendship after one of these conversations, he said, “Maybe I should check out the New Testament. Maybe I should read it for myself.” When he said that, I knew what was going to happen. If you read the New Testament when you are spiritually hungry, the most likely outcome is that you will find deep satisfaction for your soul. God will talk to you.

Sure enough, Brian became a Christian. That's the power of reading the Bible. His story is repeated over and over across cultures and across time. People read the book and discover God and faith in their reading.

To reiterate: Rule Number One is: Read the book. No other rules have any meaning until you begin doing this.

Sunday, I flew back to Maryland to visit my dad. I got into conversation with the woman sitting next to me. She mentioned she had grown up Catholic. Her mother was a truly devout woman, deeply religious, overflowing with compassion and goodness. My seat mate had gotten away from religion, but she had some vague notion of reincarnation.

She said her mother thought that reincarnation had been in the Bible until the Middle Ages, then the church took it out to increase their ability to control people through fear. What did I think of that?

I told her the New Testament had not been tampered with, that we have thousands of manuscripts from way back before the Middle Ages. If she wanted to know what is in the NT originally all she had to to was read a modern translation. Our translations are reliable. Besides, I said the NT was very brief. You could read it all in two or three hours.

I asked a few more questions and was amused. She had opinions about the NT—she thought it used to teach reincarnation—but she had never read it. In fact, she didn't even know it was only a small part of the total Bible. She did not know that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were stories about Jesus. She had never read any of it.

If you're going to get a blessing out of the Bible, the first step is to read it. The Bible is not a talisman, a holy relic, a magic spiritual object you can benefit from just by owning it or touching it.

I am critical of Muslims who make a big deal about the holiness of the Quran but who do not actually read it. I am equally critical of Christians who make a big deal out of the Bible, but don't actually read it. Occasionally someone will strongly disagree with something I say because “That's not what I learned in academy.” Or “That's not what I was taught.” Often when I then ask these people what Bible passage they would quote to either support their view point or to correct mine, they give me a blank stare. They don't know the Bible verses, but they know what they were taught. In the context of Adventism, if you're going to offer an opinion about a theological issue, you really ought to have some idea of how what you are saying connects with what the Bible actually says.

More importantly, if you're going to get a blessing out of the Bible, it's crucial to actually read it.

This is so obvious. It is also the most difficult challenge. You could learn Greek so you could study the Bible in the original language. You could read an entire library of commentaries. You could memorize the content of Bible dictionaries and read all about the culture and religion of first century Palestine. All this would be valuable. Still, unless you have sat down and read the New Testament itself, you are an outsider. Your opinions regarding the NT don't count.

AFTER you have read the New Testament, there are a number of ways to enhance your understanding. But let me say it again: AFTER you have read it. Sermons here at church. Radio and TV programs. Books. Magazines. None of these are acceptable substitutes for reading the actual book.

AFTER you have read the book, here are some things that can contribute to a richer, truer, wiser understanding.

Rule Number Two: For most of us, rule number two is, read it again. Some people remember everything they read. They read something once and get it, all of it. If that's you, you can skip the second reading. But for most people reading the NT more than once is an essential preparation for understanding.

Rule Number Three:

Pay attention to the contradictions. The people who wrote the NT were smart people. They knew what they were doing. When they include contradictions they intend to grab your attention. They want you to think. So when you encounter contradictions slow down. Ask yourself, “What is being said here?”

A couple of examples:

In Matthew 6:34, Jesus tells his disciples. “Take no thought for the morrow.” KJV. Or in modern translations: “Don't worry about tomorrow.”

At the end of Matthew 7, Jesus tells his disciples, the person who puts my actions into practice will have a good future. The one who merely listens but does not implement my teachings will face catastrophe in the future. In this passage Jesus is clearly thinking about tomorrow and is teaching his disciples to think about tomorrow.

In the gospel of John, we discover Jesus had a treasurer who kept the group's money in a bag. They did not empty their accounts every day. They kept money for tomorrow!

Not that he cared for the poor—he was a thief, and since he was in charge of the disciples' money, he often stole some for himself. John 12:6

So what did Jesus mean when he said, “Take no thought for the morrow?” He did say those words. He also said the other statements which clearly teach us to think about tomorrow. A wise student will not ignore either statement. Instead he/she will give attention to both and learn wisdom from the different perspectives offered in these passages.

Another striking statement by Jesus:

"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple. Luke 14:26

How does this passage related to Jesus declaration that our highest duty is to love God and people? Matthew 22:36ff, Mark 12:30ff, Luke 10:25ff.

And what about Jesus' endorsement of the commandment to honor our parents, even if caring for our parents required us to violate some religious rule? Matthew 15; Mark 7.

These contradictions are deliberate. They are in the Bible for a reason.

This brings us back to the first rule: read it. Read it again. Read it again. The NT is not designed as a compendium of religious trivia. It's not like a cook book or a book on weight lifting exercises or yoga postures. You flip through these kinds of books, grab an idea use it to suit yourself.

The NT is better thought of as an invitation to encounter God. One classic definition of good preaching is this: A preacher is to afflict the comfortable and to comfort the afflicted. The purpose of the Bible is not to preserve the status quo. The status quo is usually doing quite well, thank you. The purpose of the Bible is to open us to the coaching of God. As a good coach, God offers us what we do not already have in ourselves. Are you quite content? The Bible allows God to ask, could you do better? Are you discouraged, feeling hopeless and helpless? The Bible allows God to reassure you that he is pleased with you. That he takes delight in the mere fact of your existence. When the Bible agrees with you all the time, you might want to double check and make sure you are listening to the Bible.

Rule Number Four

Another way, another PROCESS for gaining wisdom from the Bible—AFTER you have read the whole thing—is to read a section, a story, a paragraph, a chapter, then sit with it prayerfully. Ask God, “What are you saying to me here? What special insight, what challenge, what reassurance are you voicing in this passage?” Then turn your attention to the words, to the characters in the story. Take time. Spend five minutes just letting your mind live with the story, paragraph or chapter.

Rule Number Five

Another PROCESS is reading commentaries. You can buy books. You can find them online. Focus on one book, say Romans or John or Matthew or James. Read the book several times. If it's a short one like James or Philippians, read the whole book every day for a week or month. Then go back through the book, reading a verse at a time and reading commentaries on that verse. You may find it useful to read several different commentaries on each verse to get different perspectives.

Rule Number Six

The ultimate development of this commentary approach is to write your own translation/paraphrase. After you have read several commentaries, put the verse into your own words. Write your own Bible. The process will plant God's words deep in your mind.

At any point in your process of interacting with the Bible, you can test what you're doing by asking questions like: How is what I learning affecting my relationships with people. Are other telling me that I am being kinder, more patient, more thoughtful, more compassionate? Or are people complaining about my self-centeredness, my rudeness, my thoughtlessness? If what you are doing with the Bible enhances life and relationships, great. If it diminishes relationships and life quality—change course. Change understanding. Investigate further.

If you engage deeply with the New Testament in the ways I've outlined, God's words will take up residence in your mind. Your instincts will begin molding themselves around the skeleton of holy words that you building. You will begin to encounter Jesus, not just in words on a page, not just in ideas and opinions but in the events and people and actions of your ordinary life. God will take up residence inside you. Goodness will no longer be alien. It will be your friend and will flow from you to others.