Know Your Bible

welcome to our know your Bible forum here at the village church put on by the village Church Institute just so glad each of you made the way out tonight on a Thursday night know there's lots of commitments and family things going on my wife has something going on so I know it's a commitment to be here we're grateful I want to start off the night just by reminding us the importance of being here and that we are all here because we want to know our Bible better there's nobody in here who would say I know my Bible well enough we're here just by virtue of saying we want to know our Bibles better Martin Luther one of my favorite theologians has a phrase that's really helpful to me he says the Bible is shallow enough for the smallest of infants to play in but it's also deep enough for the large devel of elephants to wade in and so whether you're a new believer somebody that I can remember before I came to Christ I had a Bible that sat on my night shell or my nightstand I was terrified to open it because I just didn't know what to do I didn't know where to start or how to read it and now after years of theological education and pastoral ministry I'm still saying I don't know my Bible as well as I'd like to know it and so I know that that's true of all of us here and that's just really a great thing that we want to know our Bibles better not just so that we have more intellectual information and knowledge but so that we can worship God and know him as he has revealed himself so let me just introduce a few things real quick first my name is JC English and the pastor of the village church Institute we put on forums like this about once every six months or so and that's the topics that we try to pick our topics that we think are essential for every single person in our church to know about so know your Bible we want everybody to know about in the fall we're doing we're doing a forum with Ashton Xia fat from Providence Church on how we can engage Muslims with the gospel and then later in the year we're bringing an Andy Crouch on how we're actually being discipled by technology and how technology fits in with how we can think about being Christians and being family members it's really going to be a great forum so just have those kind of in the back of your mind we'll give you the dates later let me just tell you real quick about the structure of the night so we're going to be able to hear from two of my favorite bible teachers jen Wilkin and Matt Chandler so Jen is going to spend the first 45 minutes of our forum talking about the why of biblical literacy and why we should want to know our Bibles better I will spend the next 45 minutes talking about how that can happen what are some really basic principles that all of us can use on how to know our Bibles better and then we'll do about a 25 or 30 minute QA we've decided not to take any formal breaks because it can be hard to get out and get back in but you're all adults if you need to go use the bathroom go use the bathroom if you can go get some coffee go get some coffee but we just wanted to be sensitive to your time and try to work through the material in a reasonable fashion related it a question and answers let me just show you this little slide up here real quick we want to be able to interact and engage with the actual questions that you have so if there's a question you have about something that said or presented or you came here with a specific question you can go to sly SLI do slash the village just the website and ask a question there or vote for somebody else's questions but something you can kind of do interactively throughout the night and we want to try to engage your question in the last 25 or 30 minutes of the night so let me pray for us and we'll introduce and bring up Jen Wilkin father we are just grateful grateful for the opportunity to be at a church first and foremost that believes in the authoritative Word of God it preached and it revealed to us I just pray that tonight that we wouldn't just be here for intellectual purposes but we'd be here primarily as a active worship we want to know you better and so we pray that your spirit would be amongst us teaching nourishing guiding and illuminating the word so that we can walk out of here not just simply knowing more information about the Bible but knowing the God of the Bible we ask it in Christ's name Amen please welcome Jen hello how they're reviewing I'm sure that for the young moms in the room knowing that everyone in here can go to the restroom on their own steam and by their own volition is an upside to being here tonight it's not always something you can rely on so hope you enjoy that I am so excited to get to talk about my favorite thing in my favorite place I travel around a fair amount talking about some of the things that we're going to talk about tonight in fact as I was getting ready to be here tonight I went back and counted and since September I have spoken it over 20 different events conferences women's events things like that talking about things like we're going to talk about tonight but I love to get to talk about these things among the people who I get to spend time with on a regular basis among people who are part of my own church or my own community so this is a this is a good night for me and so when I travel when I'm at an event on the weekend typically I'm doing like free sessions so I'm standing on a platform talking a whole lot and then I in between the sessions I'm meeting and talking to women and hearing about ministry and things that questions that they have and so basically the whole time that I'm traveling I'm talking and the thing is is I'm actually kind of an introvert and so when I get done when those events and I get to the airport and get on the plane let's just say that when I'm sitting in my seat to fly home I'm really not wanting a divine appointment I don't want Chatty Cathy to sit down next to me and just yuk it up the whole time and so I kind of get in my seat and I hunker down and you know I learned recently that people are actually putting headphones and their ears and listening to nothing it's just so no one will talk to them so I've started trying that a little bit and so a couple of years ago I was returning from an event and it there had been a long wait at the airport the flight was delayed and I just wanted to get home to my family I was really tired and I got on the plane and I sat down and on the plane it comes this guy he's probably got ten years younger than me and he has clearly spent the wait time for the flight to take off in the airport bar and he's coming down the aisle and he he's like talking to everyone as he goes past and I'm sitting there and I'm thinking no no no oh no no sits down right next to me and he starts chatting me up right and that plane takes off and then they bring that little cart by and he continues to avail himself of services and it becomes apparent to me increasingly that if the plane loses cabin pressure it will be my responsibility to secure his oxygen mask he's a super nice guy though and he's chatting me up he's telling me his whole life story and the thing is is that the longer this goes on and the happier so to speak that he gets the more I'm anticipating the moment when he turns to me and says so what do you do and that's when it just gets weird right and so I'm waiting and waiting and eventually because he he was actually a really great great guy he turns to me and he says so what do you do and so I take the breath and I go well actually I'm a Bible teacher and he leans back a little and he looks at me and he says huh I bet you know all 12 commandments nope I cannot say that I do not say that I do and yeah it's a funny story right it's a funny story until I tell you the rest of the story and the rest of the story is this that in all of the things that he told me about his life one of the things that he told me was that he was a product of a Christian education he had spent 12 years going through Christian school and he had since left the faith but somewhere in the midst of 12 years of Christian education he emerged thinking that there were 12 commandments something is wrong something is wrong I'm going to read to you from an article called the scandal a biblical illiteracy it's our problem it's written by dr. al Mohler who's the president of Southern Seminary and Louisville here's what he says researchers George Gallup and Jim Castelli put the problem squarely Americans revere the Bible but by and large they don't read it and because they don't read it they have become a nation of biblical illiterate how bad is it researchers tell us that it's worse than most could imagine fewer than half of all adults can name the four Gospels many Christians cannot identify more than two or three of the disciples according to data from the Barda research group 60% of Americans can't name even five of the Ten Commandments no wonder people break the Ten Commandments all the time they don't know what they are said George Barna president of the firm multiple surveys revealed a problem in stark terms according to 82% of Americans god helps those who help themselves is a Bible verse those identified as born-again Christians did better by one percent a majority of adults think the Bible teaches that the most important purpose in life is taking care of one family some of the statistics aren't enough to perplex even those aware of the problem a Barna poll indicated that at least 12% of adults believe that Joan of Arc was Noah's life another survey of graduating high school seniors revealed that over 50 percent thought that Sodom and Gomorrah were husband and wife a considerable number of respondents to one poll indicated that the Sermon on the Mount was preached by Billy Graham we are in big trouble this generation must get deadly serious about the problem of biblical illiteracy or a frightening ly large number of Americans Christians included will go on thinking that Sodom and Gomorrah lived happily ever after now the original publication date on this article is Tuesday June 29 2004 this article is 13 years old my question to you is in the intervening 13 years do you think that this problem has gotten better or worse I think you're right I think you're right if you look at the landscape of the typical church you see a dying sunday-school model which is neither good nor bad but it does mean that there is something that can typically get set aside when those environments go away so I think what we've seen are vanishing learning environments that are dedicated specifically to making sure the followers of Christ know their sacred texts so I think that's one issue I think there are a lot of other issues that are involved in this but absolutely I would say that over the last 13 years this problem has not become less pronounced it has become more pronounced all the time it is the culture shifts around us we are finding that the church is losing people who have only had a casual relationship with their sacred texts they have had the most basic understanding of what it says and what it does and it's everywhere it's everywhere which is why that I know it's probably here in my home church that I love as well so there was the night that I was speaking at something and this has happened on various occasions a woman comes to me kind of creeps over to my room after the Friday night session and she has a question she wants to ask and she doesn't want anyone really to know that she had the question and so she comes to me and she says have a question I don't understand why God would allow children to suffer because of the verse that says suffer not the little children to come unto me okay so right away the first thing I'm thinking is there's a question behind this question and that's the most important part of what's going to happen in this conversation right like a woman does not come and ask you that question unless there is a deep personal hurt or difficulty that is going on but before I can get to the question behind the question I'm also thinking about a couple of other problems that are in play here the first is you probably know she's quoting from the King James right but she's actually not quoting it accurately what does the King James say it says suffer the little children to come unto me so it's an archaic word usage we don't use it anymore and what does that term is the scene where the children are coming to Jesus and the disciples are shooing them away and Jesus says no no suffer the little children to come unto me what does it mean it means allow the little children to come unto me so there was a lot going on there right she had an old version of the Bible she was misremembering how it was quoted and she was wanting it to say something that it didn't say as the result of all of that but here's the thing about this story this woman was the pastor's wife she traveled around the country leading worship she couldn't afford for people to know what she didn't know it's at every level or how about this one I was reading in a major Christian publication an online magazine with readership in the millions and it was an excerpt from a book that was written by a name that you might recognize a woman who was sharing from her life story and she was talking about having decided who she whether she should marry or not and so she says this one night as I was speaking at a rally of about a thousand people before I stepped onto the stage I prayed father if I'm going to go further with this guy I'm dating I have to know that I'm going to do more for your kingdom married than I am single otherwise I've given my life to you and I just want to stay single it has to know do I keep dating this guy and then she says I sensed God's response to me out of Deuteronomy 30 to 30 which says how could one man chase a thousand or to put ten thousand to flight then she says God was saying to me you can choose whichever one you want if you don't marry this guy this is what you will have you have 1,000 like tonight for your whole life wherever you go I'll use you but one will chase 1000 to flight two will put ten thousands of flights so if you do marry him you will have a tenfold impact on my kingdom okay so you know what that verse is pulled from do you know what Deuteronomy 32 says it's actually a passage in which God is basically yelling at his people they have been disobedient and here's the context for those verses it says in verse 28 of Deuteronomy 32:4 they are a nation void of counsel speaking of Israel and there is no understanding in them if they were wise they would understand this they would discern their ladder and how could one of chase a thousand and to have put ten thousand to flight unless their rock had sold them and the Lord had given them up it is a verse about God allowing the enemies of Israel to put them to flight because they have abandoned his truth verse 31 for their rock is not as our Rock our enemies are by themselves for their vine comes from the vine of Sodom and from the fields of the Mura their grapes are grapes of poison their clusters are bitter their wine is the poison of serpents and the cruel venom of ASPs would you read that at your wedding now I'm a blogger I blog on national platforms I know how many eyes look at a blog post before it goes up and no one flagged this now I'm a published Christian author I know what goes into writing a manuscript and how many eyes look at it before it gets published and goes to the Christian bookstore yet no one flagged this and an excerpt so don't think for a minute that just because it got published or just because it lives on a bookshelf at a Christian bookstore that it is being faith pull to the scriptures in the way that it should be we are in big trouble something is wrong but I would guess that everybody here has some kind of regular interaction with their Bibles right I mean most of us have a quiet time or time in the word we have something because we've been told that's what we're supposed to do and we're trying to be faithful to it and we're hoping that if we put in the time if we just do what we've been told do I'm going to sit down and have my 15 minutes in the morning or whatever ever I can carve out the time that there will be a yield on that and yet why do we find ourselves some of us you know when I hear all the time the most frequent email I get women who've started doing some of the Bible studies that I put out and they'll say I have been in the church my whole life 30 years no one has taught me how to do this why is that because we've all been doing it's not as though we're all just pretending like we don't own Bibles we're trying to spend time with them now I would say that the issue is that this is something that the church is probably just left undone we've recently forgotten that we need to help people know better ways to interact with the scripture and that is why we're here tonight but before we get to that part I need to be vulnerable with you about some of the less than helpful ways that I approach Scripture left to my own devices because I think we need to acknowledge that not all approaches to spending time in the word are equally beneficial in fact based on my own experience I would argue that some are actually potentially harmful so let's take a look the first thing that I did left to my own devices trying to relate to descriptions what I like to call the xanax approach so let's say that I was having a week where I was really feeling anxious what would I do well you know what I would do right I would just read Philippians 4:6 I'd write it on a note card be anxious for nothing right okay all right all right serenity now or any now what if I was feeling ugly like say my pants didn't fit exactly right or I was having a bad hair day what am I going to read ladies Psalm 139 right you're fearfully and wonderfully made okay all right I'm fearfully wonderfully made I know I feel kind of puffy but the Lord he loves me just the way I am what if I'm tired no girl I'm so tired y'all it's been a hard week what am I going to read Matthew 11:28 come to me all you are weary and heavy-laden I will give you rest yes that's what I need Jesus I need a nap never mind that that passage ends up with rest for you or what souls that's a whole different kind of rest that Jesus is talking there about not just being fatigued but I don't care I just need to feel better it has been a hard week and you know what I wasn't just self-medicating with the scriptures I was also distributing them to my friends like a total pill pusher oh girl are you tired well listen you need to read this first you know I'm going to put on Instagram for you so that you can have it in a nice little frame and you can you are welcome you are welcome I'm so glad it made your day better what is the problem with the xanax approach to the scripture well there are many problems let's see if we can narrow it down the main one is that it treats the Bible as though it exists to make us feel better we asked the Bible how it can serve us rather than how we can serve the God that it proclaims and what's the problem with this well first of all I would just point out that the Bible doesn't always make us feel better have you noticed that Jeremiah 17:9 anyone above all else the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked who can know it feel better you're a wicked rascal the Bible doesn't always make us feel better and that means that if I employ the xanax approach enough and frequently enough over a period of years I will ensure the huge sections of my Bible will remain unread because they fail to deliver an immediate dose of emotional satisfaction the xanax approach it's terrible I don't like that I did it but there it is and that's not all that I did would you like to know what else so you know I just thought it's all good I mean the Holy Spirit inspired it if there's not like a bad part so I guess I'll just do it go wherever I want I call this the pinball approach so I would just pull back the plunger of my good intentions and release it and send the bot the the metal ball of my ignorance hurtling toward whatever passage it happened to hit so it might land in the New Testament first and I'd read a little bit out of the Gospels and then maybe I bounced back to the Old Testament and get into Leviticus and be like okay that's weird and so then maybe okay Psalms I'll try try the psalm you know and I would just sort of ricochet around the various passages as the spirit leads which sounds so good right don't I sound like I'm really into this and really spiritual what is the problem what's the problem with the pinball approach well I would point out first that the Bible was not written to be read this way the Bible is a book and then it is also 66 books within a book and it was not written to be read this way in fact I would argue that virtually no book was written to be read this way so think back to high school algebra for a second think back to when you were in high school algebra and let's say that you walked into your algebra class on the first day of the semester and you sit down and there is your algebra text sitting on your desk and you open it up and you flip to chapter 5 and you read a paragraph out of the middle of chapter 5 and I mean you really try to read it closely and then you sit for a minute and you like kind of soak in now how should that change my life today and then you close your algebra book and you leave and you come back you come back the next day and you sit down you do the same thing but this time you turn to chapter 8 and you paragraphs out of that and you go through the same process again right and then let's say that you come out the next day and you do the same thing and you come back the next day and you do the same thing and use that for the whole semester let me ask you something how are you going to do on that final how good are you going to be at algebra you're going to fail because that's not the way an algebra text is meant to be read right and it's meant to you start at the beginning it's building on ideas it's pointing toward a main point it's written by a particular person for a particular purpose at a particular time so here's the thing the Bible is much more than just a book but it certainly is a book and often we treat it with less respect than we would give to a common textbook the 66 books of the Bible are meant to be read as any book as by starting at the beginning working our way through to the end the people who wrote them under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit built their arguments they arranged the text they made things go in a particular order to draw a particular conclusion and to teach a particular thing so the pinball approach is not great because it's only going to yield you a fragmentary understanding of a bunch of text here and there but no comprehensive understanding that was not all that I did and this next one I'm particularly not proud of but let's just get it out of the way the other way that I like to interact with scripture well so you know I'm in college at this point and I'm worried because I have a lot of decisions in front of me and things that I have to figure out and I thought oh my gosh well God's Word is living active right so I began using it using what I call the magic 8-ball approach you remember the magic 8-ball right you had those did you have that you know you sit around for hours before you had cell phones and you'd shake that thing up and you'd ask all kinds of questions and wait to see if signs appointed - yes okay and so I'm like you know I don't know should I should I should I date cragger or should I date Jeff right and I want to okay okay some trust in chariots and horses we trust in the name of the Lord our God okay Craig drives a Mustang and there's a horse on the front but Jeff he drives a Cavalier and his bumper sticker says God is his co-pilot he trusts in the Lord our God call Craig up hey Craig God says I'm not supposed to date you anymore so the magic 8-ball approach what do you know any problem that you have what is it you know what job are you going to take where you going to live what you which house should you buy should I change my hair color shake that thing up point to a verse and see a signs points yes what is the problem with the urinal you're looking at me but I know you've all done it so what's the problem with the magic 8-ball approach well first I would just point out that the Bible is not magical and it does not serve our whim and when we treat the Bible in this way we are demanding that it tell us what to do the Bible is actually primarily concerned not with telling us what to do in a particular circumstance but rather with telling us who to become who to be not only that but when we use the Bible in this way we're actually doing something that's pretty dangerously close to Seuss saying asking the Lord to tell us the knowledge of the future and in the Old Testament you remember what the punishment was for that it was stoning yeah yeah so let's be careful with that and it's interesting because there's something else is revealed and approaching the Bible in this way and I think it's that we say I need wisdom from the scriptures right and so we come and we go through the magic 8-ball singing we're like lord give me wisdom give me with them but let's be honest for a second are we really asking for wisdom when we approach the Scriptures that way what we're actually asking for is not wisdom but knowledge knowledge because wisdom is taking the facts that you have and making the best decision with the fact that you have knowledge is the fact so I think about this in terms of my own kids so my oldest son his name's Matt and he's 21 years old now he'll be home tomorrow actually for a little bit before he leaves for the rest of this summer what if he came down to breakfast on Saturday morning and he said to me mom what should I have for breakfast should I have the oatmeal or the eggs hey mom should I wear the red shirt today or the blue shirt mom should I Drive to work or should I rhyme and I'd be like honey pull it together you're too old to be asking these questions because what does a good parent do to raise a child to maturity you don't keep feeding them the right answers what do you do you train them to take the facts that they have and make the best decision you want to raise children who have wisdom of decision making skills and have with them how much more so our Heavenly Father why do we expect that when we interact with the scripture he's just going to hand us red shirt blue shirt marry this person marry that person why would we not assume that he is more concerned with having mature followers those who have moved on from milk to solid food so magic 8-ball I don't recommend it but then I got more clever I engaged in a technique that I referred to as the personal shopper approach so I would think okay I need to know how to be a godly woman or I know I need to know how to deal with self-esteem issues or you know how to how to get my finances in line according to what the Bible says but I'm not really sure how to find verses on that so I am going to just let insert famous big-name Bible teacher here pull all that together for me into a study I'm going to let that person do the legwork for me because they know how to do those things right so this is the classic topical study and there are topical studies available on all kinds of different topics and strictly speaking even if you were doing a study on something like the Trinity if you were doing a study on a doctrine it would be a topical study so what I am NOT saying right now is that topical studies are not good for you I actually think they're great we need topical studies that can integrate for us broad concepts from across Scripture so we need them but I would just note that topical studies do not help us build ownership of Scripture because what are they doing they are taking passages and attaching them to the topic whereas if you were reading through a book from start to finish you would find that the passage is introducing the topic as it comes up in the text so those are two very different things and much like a pinball approach they will yield you a fragmentary knowledge of many books of the Bible but mastery of none so they're definitely profitable they have their place but the problem is they're not foundational foundational study is getting just that first-hand knowledge of the text under our skin and here's what I find I find that over time many of us have gotten into a pattern where we are completely given to doing topical studies and have set aside any attempt to do anything else that's a line-by-line study of the text because the topical study is just kind of neatly packaged in there for us and over time we've lost our sense of having sort of a balance between those things but here's another thing that I decided to do to interact with my Bible I call this the telephone game do you remember that game when you were a kid and the fun thing was you would whisper a phrase into someone's ear and it would travel around the room and how distorted it got by the time I got to the last person was what made the game funny and it's super funny when it's a kids game but it's less funny when we start talking about getting into the scriptures so let's say for example that you are well Jenny buddy listen to a podcast anybody read blog posts all that kind of stuff so we have a steady diet and a lot of access to all kinds of commentary on the Scriptures the commentary doesn't just live between the pages of a bound book that you purchased in the commentary section of the bookstore commentary a simple way of thinking about it is it's what someone said about the Bible okay which means that even the study notes in your Study Bible are commentary there what someone said about the Bible and here's what can happen in the telephone game I began to prefer listening to sermons or reading commentaries or podcasts or blogs to actually spending time in the text itself because when I spend time in text it was confusing and hard and when I read commentaries it made more sense or when I listened to someone else talk about it so let's say that you're reading a John Piper book and in that book John Piper quotes Agustin and Agustin quotes the Apostle Paul what do you think just happened there you just read what someone said about what someone said about the Bible and sometimes it's further removed than that sometimes it's best more quoting John Piper who's quoting Agustin who's quoting the Apostle Paul and so on and so on and we can get into a situation where we're reading what someone said about what someone said about what someone said about the Bible which begins to beg the question at what point are we going to read the Bible right now it doesn't mean that when John Piper put that quote into his book that he misused it or that it didn't add to your understanding it just means that what someone said about the Bible is only going to take on the meaning for you that it should when you actually know what the Bible says because if you spent any time with commentaries like let's say you did go to the Christian bookstore and you bought three commentaries on the Gospel of Matthew and you lay them out side-by-side and you start reading them do you know what disturbing thing you're going to find they don't all agree so now what well you're going to need some first-hand knowledge of the text so the telephone game we need to break our commentary addiction and what that means for most of us is at least quitting cold turkey in the short term it means when we come to the text we don't read a passage and then rush to see what someone said about it we wait and we try to gain first-hand knowledge ourselves because ultimately I will not stand before God and give a count for how well Matt Chandler loved God with his mind or John Piper loved God with his mind or Beth more or less God with her mind I will stand before God and give an account for how well I love God with my mind so the telephone game commentaries are absolutely profitable they are profit layered on top of a first-hand knowledge of the text and then another thing that I did in my unhelpful ways that I pressed the scripture I like to call the Jack Spratt approach you remember Jack Spratt he would eat no fat and his wife would eat no lean I cannot relate to his wife to him at all his wife's kind of right up my alley this is when we engage in picky eating with the text so we were like well I just really like the New Testament because the Old Testament God's kind of scary or you know maybe the Saul's in Proverbs but I just writers don't go there and anyway the New Testaments where it all really happened so I don't know or we read books with characters or plots or topics that we can easily identify with right the ones that seemed the most accessible to us when we go back to them again and again and again so what's the problem with the Jack Sprat approach well by its own reports how much of Scripture is god-breathed and profitable all of it so if it is true that all Scripture is god-breathed and profitable hadn't we better try to work to spend time in all of it all of it I'm 48 years old I'm not there yet but I'll tell you what I'm going to keep trying I want to try to get as much of it in as I can because if it's all profitable I do not want to miss out on the profitability of any of it so what are the implications of this women it is time for some of you to move beyond Esther Ruth and proverbs 31 you got it move on men some of you might check out those books you realize there are no pink parts and blue parts in Scripture right like there's not like oh girl this is our section we'll let the man go over there and read about Gideon it is all for you we need the Old Testament to understand the New Testament the Old Testament is what brings the New Testament to life you know why because guess what all of the New Testament authors knew inside and out the old past they want you to be thinking about it when they are writing in the New Testament we need all parts of it so I look back over my shameful practices and I ask myself where was the disconnect like where was the main disconnect in what is going on and what I was asking the Bible to do and I think that if I could boil it down it would be that I was asking the Bible to appeal to my heart now what a must believers want like those of us who have it we especially if you came out of a bad background and you're just so grateful that you're a believer now if I asked you know what is it that you want is part of your Christian life what do you want the yield to be most people would say I want to know God's will and want to be transformed I don't want to be who I was anymore right like I want the grace of God and the Holy Spirit working through me to transform me I don't want to be that person anymore and I just want to know the will of God but I think we have to ask the question what is the path to that transformation like how does that transformation happen does it begin with our hearts so what does Jeremiah 17:9 say again above all else the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked who can know it well I don't know that I want that driving the bus now have you ever gone through a time of crisis how reliable are your feelings when you are going through a crisis those son of a guns will lie and lie and lie and lie to you why because the heart is deceitful it is desperately wicked the heart wants what it wants and what it always wants is not always what it needs right so is that where do we just have to want to want do we have to want different adjustments to want the different thing like how does that even work well thankfully the scripture does not leave us to wonder about what the path of transformation is romans 12:2 says do not be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world praise God that's what I want I don't want to be conformed any longer who I was I don't want to be that person anymore what does it say next but be transformed hallelujah that's what we want we want to be transformed by the renewing of your or mine by the renewing of your mind that by testing you may discern what is the will of God so yeah do we have to want different things yes the question is how do we begin to want different things well I would urge you to consider that the path of transformation is through the mind to the heart why because if I want to change what I love I would point out to you that the heart cannot love what the mind does not know the heart cannot love what the mind does not know so I can't learn to love the better thing if I don't know what it is and where do we find out the knowledge of a better thing we find it out here because once your mind knows your heart begins to be transformed maybe you don't believe me let me give you a little illustration I work here this is where I work my office is right back there and sometimes I forget to bring my lunch in but conveniently for me or perhaps this is the most terrible thing that has ever happened there is a chick-fil-a located in the far corner of the parking lot so over a course of time I developed a perfectly happy relationship with the chick-fil-a milkshake are you familiar with it they have seasonal offerings it's delightful in the fall it's the pumpkin spice by Christmas they're doing a little peppermint number then in the spring they introduced the strawberry what comes after strawberry who knows peach amen peach is next and I loved it we had such a happy happy relationship until a couple of years ago when some at the FDA decided it would be great to put the nutritional information on the drive up and then every time I would pull through that drive through and get ready to order my peach milkshake I would look and see and I would see and then I knew and I knew what I never wanted to know what I never would have chosen to know on my own and the eyes of my heart were opened and I quit the milkshake cold turkey except that I didn't but I did overtime because once I knew what was in it I could not keep going back to it because you know what happened once I knew what began to happen to my desires I began to desire the better thing our desires begin to be changed and redirected to what is good and right and true when we behold it yeah that's that verse in the psalms psalm 34:7 it's one of the most misappropriated verses in all of scripture it says delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart people love this verse this is one of the ones you put on Instagram right why do we love it because it sounds like if I just you know make a show of delighting and guy maybe I really even feel it what's he going to do is going to give me whatever I want that sounds fantastic except that I don't think that's what's going on in that verse the person who delights in the Lord is the person who has beheld the Lord as delightful in here right and that person the person who delights himself in the Lord receives new desires were transformed by the renewing of our mind and our desires begin to align with the very heart of God we begin to want what he wants and when you want what God wants guess what he will give it to you delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart he gives us new desires and what I began to realize is that many of my time in the word practices failed to transform because they were appealing to my heart with no regard for my head they were appealing to my feelings with no regard for my reason and my hope my prayer for the church for this church and for all churches particularly as the culture shifts around us and the secular humanist and the false teacher making their inroads my prayer for all of you is that you would have a reason faith that you would have a sinking faith that is ground the fact of who God declares himself to be in his word that's going to require that we begin to distinguish between devotional reading and studying that we begin to ask okay the time that I'm spending in the scriptures is it actual study or is it someone going here here's a little neatly packaged thing and when you get done with this you're going to feel mmm you're going to move on with your day because we live in an instant gratification culture right that would be pictured probably most clearly by me in the drive-thru at the chick-fil-a we want what we want when we want it and generally speaking we can have it like when I heard that Amazon was piloting drones to see if they could drop stuff on my porch like 15 minutes after I imagined it in my head I was like I am totally for that in fact I would like them to get that technology into the hands of the Girl Scouts so that the cookies show up faster we have a short-term mindset around so many things we have an instant gratification mindset around so many things and one of those things is this and we have to shift our understanding it cannot be that we take a debit card approach to our time in the scriptures it cannot be that we go okay I've got my 15 minutes in the morning so I'm going to put my little debit card in and I'm going to withdraw my little bit of mm-hmm to get me through the day this girl whew don't start with Jesus in the morning your whole day is shot it's going to like speak a magical thing over my day because I went and I sat down I had my little thing except what if that weren't the way that we thought about that time what if instead of viewing our timing the word is a debit account which we would draw what we think we need to get through the day what if we viewed it instead as a savings account you're going to read the Bible differently if you do that you're not going to ask it to give you anything perhaps in the time that you're able to give it in the morning you're going to say this is a savings account I'm going to sit down and I'm like in chapter 2 of Matthew I'm working my way through and I'm going to do it I'm going to read it faithfully and when I get to the end of it I may not be able to draw any great conclusion out of it today but I'm going to put that deposit into the savings account I'm going to so the Lord is going to yield a return on that at just the right time because think about that think about when you've been in crisis in your life right think about when you've had the bad phone call or the terrible thing has happened and you're so locked up you're so traumatized that the thought of even opening your Bible is overwhelming to you what if it's in that dark night of the soul that the Lord yields up treasure to you that you deposited ten years ago would that be enough for you because I think that's probably more illustrative of how our time in the word should be working some of you have had that experience some of you know but that is the way that this can work we must have a long-term view we must view our time in the word as a savings account versus a debit account before I hand things over to Matt I want to say the most crashing ly obvious statement you will hear all night long because I think it's another thing that we're going to need to keep in view are you ready for it the Bible is a book about God peace be with you the Bible is a book about God now I would guess that no one here would say I do not believe that I would say probably no one here walked in the room saying no it's not and I would say that in my entire time of having contact with it I have never thought that it was not a book about God but you know the problem was I wasn't reading it as though it was I was actually reading it as though it was a book about me okay so you know that story of Moses and the burning bush where he's in Midian and he's hurting sheep in turns and looks and he sees a bush and it's not consumed and he says I'll go over there and see what's going on and so he goes over to the bush and you know that the bush is that the Ossining it's God and God speaks to him audibly out of the bush right and says I am the Lord the God of Abraham god of your father's they've been the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob so he clearly did players just in case Moses a little fuzzy from being up on the mountain too long hey guess what I'm exactly who you think I am and You Know Who I am based on how identify myself and then he declares his intention for Moses to go in and draw the people out of Egypt he wants him to go in and talk to Pharaoh now has anybody here ever said if God would just tell me what to do I would do it like if he would just speak audibly to me I would do it yeah so because this has just happened to Moses Moses goes great when do we leave let's go get everybody out of Egypt except that he doesn't what does he say but Who am I that I should go in to Egypt and do this thing and so because he has refused to do what the audible voice of God has told him to do the sky opens up and a thunderbolt comes down and singes him right on the spot game over stories over except that's not what happens right God is long-suffering he is patient with him and God comes back to him and notice what he doesn't say he does not say Oh Moses you are a precious son of the king you are fearfully and wonderfully made you've got this you are enough what does he say to him this is but I will go with you and carrying this beautiful reassurance most strategic except that he doesn't he comes back and says but who I'm going to say send me what does God say tell them I am sent you five times in the narrative Moses says but who am i that I should do this and God comes back and says but I will be with you but I only with you what's going on here Moses is confused he needs to understand that the success or failure of his mission into Egypt and no way depends on who he is and in every way depend on I am here's the thing the Bible is our burning bush it is a faithful declaration of the nature and character of God from its opening page to its last page and we stand and we say Who am I Who am I Who am I Who am I when all the time it is calling to us I am the Bible is a book about God and we should read it as such we should read asking first what it has to tell us is true about God because as John Calvin says and opening lines of the Institute the knowledge of God in the knowledge of self always go hand in hand there is no true knowledge of self apart from the knowledge of god I can't properly understand who I am apart from seeing who he is and what I believe that the church lacks with regard to wanting to study the Bible with the want to is we lack an understanding of the transformative power of a vision of God high and lifted up and that is exactly what your time in the word will restore to you I hear so often people saying I want a fresh word from the Lord oh I want to hear the word the Lord speak audibly to me I want to me if you would just tell me what to do I would do it and I'm telling you no you would not based on scripture not just Moses others - everybody has a favorite John Piper quote would you like to know mine if you want to hear God's speak read your Bible if you want to hear God's speak audibly read your Bible out loud here's the thing that I encounter over and over again interacting with the Scriptures for whatever reason that is the part of discipleship that we thought would be easy like we understand that missions will be hard we understand sharing the gospel the neighbour will be hard we understand that we cost to our finances cost to the way that we live our lives cost to our I don't know our clothing choices I don't know all kinds of costs associated square words we will be able to say anymore we got all these things that we think will be hard about following Christ but for some reason when we think about learning who God is in his word we think he should just dump that on me magically but you know what the root definition for the term disciple is learner disciple is a learner and closely associated with that word disciple is discipline some by that you came here tonight because the discipline of learning god's word is profitable the word of god is living and active sharper than any two-edged sword dividing us dividing us and rendering us whole so Matt's going to come and he is going to talk to you about what that looks like this good hard work which yields its fruit in season let me pray Heavenly Father I thank you for your word which is a gift to us father we repent of asking for a fresh word when the word of the Lord which stands forever is in our hands and does never grow stale for us we pray Lord that you would teach us to be disciplined in our approach that we would treat this book with reverence and with respect recognizing it as a storehouse of treasure that you make available to us make it precious to us lord help us to be transformed we ask these things in Jesus name thanks to so for my block you'll you'll need something to write on and with and your Bible and so John 15 it was scrolling when you came in if you got here a little bit early if you didn't it was it was scrolling let me start my section just by saying this to you one of the more mind-blowing truths in the universe is that the creator of that universe wants to talk to you he wants to inform you and show you and speak to you and and maybe I could let us feel the weight a little bit about about that little sentence I just said by telling a story that's a bit of a humble brag so I'm just taking the option most of you from the village I feel safe I been the president of acts 29 for seven years it's a church planning organization we have a large fundraiser every year in Dallas and so that's coming up in two weeks and so many I have just been grinding on this fundraiser it'll it's Thursday night May 25th you're not about to get invited to it relax all right and I've just been working on it and inviting and gathering one of the roles of a president its fundraising and so that's what I've been working on we're trying to raise 1.5 million dollars and so I'm grinding and then I I see an email in my inbox show up just late last week so I open up that email and here's what the email said dear pastor Chandler on Thursday or on Friday night May 26th you two will be playing at AT&T Stadium on their Joshua tree tour Bono has a small list of pastors he would like to get together with for dinner the night before Thursday May 25th would you be able to make that work you know what my answer is no I can't make it work I mean I'm I've got response to and surely I'm going to get that invite again right now here's what happened I felt two things uh one elation and one words that shall not be spoken in show try and and yet here here's what the reason I tell you that story is a kind of humble black is that Bona when I took men that was kind of a cool deal like a really really really cool deal like I would skip probably anything else on earth if it except for that and and yet here's what here's the truth about Bono he's a human being is going to die is going to stand in front of God and give an account for his life but you know who really wants to talk to me anytime I want to kind of lean in and hear the creator god of the universe and and this is what you and I have been invited into and so let me dive into this got to talk about you can't talk about the Bible without tell about the Holy Spirit you just can't because you can't read the Bible correctly without the Holy Spirit right I said last week if you were here for our Exodus series we were talking about hearing the word believing the word and doing the word and when we were talking about hearing the word I said that the Christian hears the Bible differently than the non-christian right the believer hears the Word of God in a way that's illuminated by the power of the Holy Spirit and that's why you can turn on the Discovery Channel and hear a New Testament scholar really speaking things that are categorically false and unorthodox because he's approaching the Word of God without the Holy Spirit so you can't talk about the Bible without talking about the Holy Spirit the Bible teaches us that it's the Holy Spirit that guides us into truth it's the Holy Spirit that enables us to discern air and it's the Holy Spirit that illuminates our minds with insight to understand and accept the truth you cannot read the Bible correctly without the whole spirit becomes empty religious platitudes that don't transform gotta have the power of the Holy Spirit what what is the power of the Holy Spirit work in the word to accomplish it combat sin it causes spiritual growth it reveals our true motives and it conforms us to the image of Christ the Holy Spirit through the Word of God is accomplishing those things so it is I'll say it it is a mistake to ascribe to the Bible alone those things it's the Spirit of God through the word of God accomplishing those things and then lastly what's the purpose of God's Word before we get into how to approach this or at least a way to approach this the purpose of God's Word it reveals God's nature reveals God's character and reveals God's will for his creation so that's the purpose of God's Word so three basic steps that were going to talk about tonight comprehension interpretation and application my son 11 year old of let him read through my outline he's like Oh CIA so it's like oh that's clever I'll give you credit so CIA comprehension interpretation application maybe if you've done something like this before a lot of times that first step is called observation I don't know that I really care for observation because it sounds like you might see something different than actually there so I want to talk about comprehension and and I don't think I think my section is a lot easier because I don't think I'm going to say anything new or mind-blowing to you right like when we talk about comprehension II here's what we're saying what does the text say like what does it say now we can talk about a lot of other little things like I think that you should have a place on a time that you consistently get to I think if you don't plan this it's not naturally going to happen look right now you're not going to find like this hour with nothing to do we're all sudden you're like you know what I'm gonna do dive into the riches of God's Word that's not coming for you you already know it I can look around the room you know that's not coming for you this is planned this is a part of your rule of life this is a part of rhythm you're saying I'm going to make this a priority here's where I'm going to put this if you do not do this you are already wasting your diet here tonight if you're not willing to go I'm going to find an hour and I'm going to block it if you're like are you sure in hours and up literally in an hour a day five days a week over 20 years is going to yield for you a crop of fruitfulness that you probably can't fathom right now right and so it's not there is no silver bullet here where you're going to get this thing downloaded like the matrix it's one byte at a time one hour at a time over a long period of time but these things are accomplished via the power of Holy Spirit using word so we're talking about comprehension what does it say so step one you ready read it you got to read it you probably shouldn't need to write that one down in your notes maybe you do but you're like read okay you should just be alright right so when we're talking about reading here's what we're talking about so let's chat for a second because you do read the Bible a specific way you want to read the Bible carefully you want to read it carefully you want to read it repeatedly you want to read it patiently don't if I'm going too fast for you I've got your journal so that we can actually do some of this with John 15 here in a moment I can email these notes to you if you're type-a and just desperately need them but you're going to want to read it carefully repeatedly patiently prayerfully purposefully and inquisitively I want to as much as I can at the village church encourage your curiosity around the Bible to just explode like what is that why is that there what is that all about that's weird I've got to get to the bottom of that like don't don't you know that delights the heart of God like I can tell you this when when I get really really curious about something going on in my wife's soul and start to chase it and try to understand it and ask questions about and try to draw it out and encourage it and rejoice in it things are really healthy and beautiful and fun in my marriage and so if we're seeing in order what is that what is that about that's confusing and wonder what to do with that and I'm just writing it down it likes like that's that delights the heart of God you're seeking you're mining you're wanting to know more about its character wanting to know more about his nature so be inquisitive ask questions and so after we read carefully repeatedly patiently prayerfully purposefully inquisitively we ask the right questions so let's talk about that who is talking or being talked about that's when you're reading the Bible someone's talking right now there there's on rules we'll get to in a moment where that doesn't carry as much weight but but somebody's talking and somebody's being talked about you should make note of that should make note of that what is the subject or object being discussed what comes before and what follows after now again if you're an English teacher or a history teacher right now you're like yeah right because because this is this is actually just reading to comprehend something where is the activity or discussion taking place when is the activity or discussion taking place why what's the purpose of the activity how are the people involved responding and then here are some things to look for as you're reading carefully repeatedly patiently peripherally purposely inquisitively and asking questions keywords or phrases anything that keeps repeating itself you're looking for you're looking for the structure how it's arranged like you're just kind of outlining or sketching out what you're reading and then you're looking for and I talked about this one a lot at the village you're looking for the atmosphere of the text and and I I think that's I haven't heard anybody else talk about the atmosphere of the text as much as it's super helpful for me reading my Bible and here's what I mean by the atmosphere of the text like what's the emotive state of the text are the people in the text in doubt are they afraid or they filled with joy or they I want to get a as a part of comprehending what's going on in the text what the atmosphere is doubt joy instruction encouragement and then I want to consider the literary form literary form matters so you've got narrative and so narrative conveys history and truth in the form of facts stories parables accounts biographies etc from a theological perspective that's Genesis Exodus that's the book of Acts then you've got discourse and this course is designed to present ideas concepts doctrines or facts in a logical order Lee fashioned and often in the forms of argument letter lecture sermon or speech this is Romans this is the book of Ephesians this is Hebrews this is the Sermon on the Mount then there's poetry poetry involves primarily the expression of emotions feelings and ideas as a means of conveying truth that's job Psalms Song of Solomon and then you have the prophetic that involves the use of symbolic language to reveal or uncover that which was previously unknown that's Isaiah Ezekiel Daniel revelation now I want you I can't over state this comprehension of the text has nothing to do with you look at it has no word we're not about you just yet in our study there's nothing for you just yet in our study we want to know what does it say but what's going on here not now what's going on here we're going to get to that praise His name but what's going on in the test what's the Bible saying and so here's what we're going to do because it's not a win for you to walk out of here tonight with some steps but not believing that you can do it right and and so they're going to I'm going to have to ask you because of time to break some of the rules that I just laid out for you and we're just going to be alright with that night you and I are just gonna be cool with it you kind of know it's going to take more than ten minutes at a time but here's what I'm going to give you just 10 minutes and we're going to look at John one through 17 and as you read it I want you to kind of do this right I want you to begin to comprehend that text what it's saying you're reading it carefully slowly repeatedly you don't gonna have time to do it repeatedly just go slowly and carefully once or twice through I guess twice would be a repeat read it twice through right and and then begin to look for keywords and phrases is anything repeated start to take note of anything you notice about its structure well it's the atmosphere of it can you pick up on the tone and atmosphere of the text who is talking who's being talked to what exactly are they talking about what's the subject or object being discussed is there activity taking place so I'm going to start my little timer here when we hear stargaze go off we'll know our times up so 10 minutes for comprehension let's go job guys now me I want to stop for a second make you aware like I feel like one of the jobs that I have here is to consistently as consistently as possible in 2017 when we live in which a world that's disenchanted is remind you that you're caught up in some pretty hefty spiritual realities here and so you will this is my experience you will fight a good period of time wrestling with a wandering mind and distraction a type of wandering mind and distraction that does not take place when you're looking at Instagram and does not take place when you're binge watching Netflix and I'll tell you why because I think the enemy has us where he wants us when the mind is off and unengaged from the Word of God and our enemy are very real and present enemy cannot have us digesting the Word of God it makes us powerful it transforms us it conforms us into the image of Jesus Christ he is already defeated but it's not going quietly into that lake of fire and and then we start to dig in and feed off the Word of God a lot of his little tricks and and things stop working he can't have that so if you surely you've picked up on the fact that that you can do quite a bit of stuff without being distracted but if you try to pray or dig in your Bible then then all of a sudden gosh you just can't seem to dial in that spiritual warfare will eventually teach on that that's not tonight let's talk about now interpretation now Before we jump ahead and make interpretation about us interpretation is still not about us right so we've comprehended and now we want to interpret when we say interpretation we want to determine the meaning of the passage when originally written right so not interpret it what does that mean for 2017 that's not the question yet right he wrote this to someone at that time when they heard it what did it mean so here's some general rules number one interpret literally now there's two types of literally and let me give those to you you've got plain literal so I'll give you an example that God formed man of the dust we just believe that right we just literally believe that's how man came to be that that God made us from the dust and breathe life into us right now there's also figurative figurative literal and and that would be Herod as a fox right he's not a fox right but that's the Apostle Paul saying watch out for the dogs he's not like okay look Philippians a lot of wild dogs out there I'm just saying you got to be careful a little wild dog knowing he's calling people not that that's figurative literal in the passage you just read what was the figurative literal fine branches right this is figurative literal interpret in context and so let's talk about this I think interpreting in context is the single most important factor for correct interpretation and and so how do you do that like again if you're an English history teacher you know this ears have verses sentences paragraphs surrounding paragraphs chapters sections books Bible right that that's what we mean by context so how do you interpret this well you look at the verse but then you want to scan out and look at the sentence and then scan out and look at the paragraph and scan out and look at the chapter and scan out and look at the chapters and scan out and look at the book and then scan out and look at the Bible and if you're like all in an hour no no like I said we're doing this we're doing this an hour at a time for 40 years and you will be stunned at what that does I'm just saying you will be stunned at what that does we've been talking a lot lately at the village about just embracing the normal you know what the normal is an hour in the Bible not not like I not a lot at my little kitchen island thing not a lot of like you know fireworks that go off or you know the Holy Spirit just personally showing up in bodily form sitting next to me like we read let me explain that to you right it's just working through it Penn Journal context so we interpret in context so my least favorite or my favorite example of this is I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength like you know that doesn't have anything to do with sports I was so stunned to read that in context when I first went through the book of Philippians I was like wait he's not talking about basketball or football he's come up being content and wealth or poverty context matters otherwise you slap that on the back of a t-shirt with a guy swinging a bat and you make it all about who like gin debt oh no no it's about God being enough regardless of our circumstances and that's better and that's better right we interpret in context this want to be a little bit more difficult so spend a little bit of time chatting about it we interpret in view of history and culture so I'll explain that and then I'll give you some rules that will help us historical who's the author when was it written where was it written why was it written who was it written to what was the political climate the economic climate the social climate the religious climate legal climate the ethical climate and if yours like not an hour bro not now I think a good study bottle there's a lot of people when they talk about reading the Bible for yourself that are anti Study Bible I'm not one of those I think a good Study Bible is really helpful just don't find out for yourself wrestle a little bit for yourself but before you dive down and you certainly don't have to wrestle about date and author right it's like I just want to just start figured this out without looking down I know that God wants to speak to me here when was this written right you don't have to do that you can just look down and use your Study Bible now cultural settings because culture will say you are going to find more and more and more those who do not want to obey the historic Christian Orthodox faith are going to use the argument of culture to remove the authority from the Word of God if you're paying attention you're seeing this everywhere now that's not really what this was that's not really what that means see what was happening in that period of time was to take away a clear command from the Word of God that this way to life this way to death you see this consistently now on the topic of sexuality you see it consistently right now in in conversations about gender well well we didn't that's not what they're addressing they're addressing something else with culture it's huge we're talking about interpreting in view of culture here's what culture is culture is what people believed what they said what they did what they wore what they ate what they made what they practiced so here are some questions that you have to ask around the cultural piece what was the purpose of the cultural practice or teaching like what was its purpose again a good study Bible will help you do this we'll talk about commentaries commentaries I'll help you do this I already saw one of the questions was how do you find the best commentaries and so we'll try to answer that question it's really an easy one best commentaries calm but I don't have to answer that one now I'm not kidding that's a really corny website name and a brilliant website would the cultural practice have the same significance today we've got to ask ourselves that question is there a timeless principle and then here would be the rule I think you should always default to assume every teaching or practice of Scripture is applicable for today unless three unlesss the context restricts it don't make graven images don't do that so that that's kind of a cultural practice and the text goes yeah don't do that right and is what the Word of God does it steps into every culture and corrects it right second thing later revelation overrules it who likes bacon and praise His name for progressive revelation right the dietary laws are an example of this right you reading the old a here's what is unclean and then Peter goes up on that bless it plays the name of Jesus roof and we get ourselves some bacon it's clearly unique to that culture right and and I'll use one that's easy to see right in Genesis chapter 47 don't know if you're familiar with it but Jacob says to Joseph come here and put your hand under my thigh and swear an oath to me like it if you're working through your little bottle reading plan and you're in Genesis and you read that but you do not go put your hand up under somebody saw and make a promise do you swear you'll be they're coming yes I do like that's not no no that that is that is not that is not what we do in our culture what's what's the what it's this right is that I swear like I swear you've got my promise right so so we it's clearly unique to that culture right now interpret in light of the literary form the form matters you do not interpret poetry the same way you interpret history you will find a lot of skeptics about the Bible point to poetry as a way to try to say the Word of God isn't truth right but but they would never do that with Edgar Allan Poe you know that right they're not really a ray when are you serious it was rap tap tap and I just refuse to believe that like yeah because it's poetry there's something going on on nice it so you don't read poetry like you read history like you rewrite these are yeah so literary form matters scripture interprets scripture scripture interprets scripture the Bible will never contradict itself so what happens when it does it doesn't so when it appears to let your what in the world is that take over and dive in deep like I I love when something like that flares in my own personal study because then I just got myself a little adventure let's get to the bottom of this let's figure out what's going on here choose I'm going to try to help you choose a simple natural meaning over a more complex one I don't know if you've ever seen somebody do this they take something's like couldn't just mean what it said well actually this is it here's like okay man you're like you're like four points deep with 13 sub points under all of those points and it looks like I should just love the Lord my God with all my heart mind soul my whole being should love the Lord right just just give in to a simple natural meaning over a more complex one the New Testament and the Old Testament help us understand one another they are not different gods they help us understand one another we have got to get better at the Old Testament because it will help inflame our hearts permission and the kingdom of God in the new you cannot understand the new outside of the narrative in the old of what God's up to listen I'll say that we don't have a lot of times you can't understand the parables of the kingdom without understanding in a very real way some of the things that Daniel taught on and why people were so confused when Jesus came not overthrowing Rome because the vision Daniel god of the coming Messiah was one that destroyed iron and steel that represented the nations that were too and so the people in the first century had been steeped in this Old Testament idea that the kingdom of God was going to come and just melt people's faces off but Jesus comes goes no no no it's gonna be like a mustard seed no no you know what's going to be like the wheat and the tares they're going to grow up together it's disorienting wool aren't you supposed to destroy the wicked not yet I will but right now the wheat and the tares are going to grow up together side by side so the victory has been won the evil age is not over yet because of my kindness and mercy it's like a mustard seed it's gonna it's the smallest of seeds and yet when it's done the birds of the air will rest in it right we've got to get in the Old Testament interpret unclear or ambiguous passages in view of plain clear central ones I don't know if you've you've been around people that do this quite a bit where they get really hung up on this one ambiguous passage when there's like 10 like super clear ones on the subject but it's this one they just can't let go of no no the Bible interprets about the Bible's helping you make sense of that Bible verse all over here so use these to help you understand these right and then lastly interpret in view of theological consistency test any proposed interpretation to determine its theological consistency God does not change he does not waver so again these are all opportunities for you to dive in I've oftentimes talked about reading and feeding and digging in the Word of God like I've tried to pursue my wife's heart like I want to kind of dig around in there and figure out what's going on and at any time it's new because I've been married to learn 18 years that means I've been married to seven different women all in that body all right and and then there are these seasons from like okay this is new when I figured get to get to learn this woman this is awesome and it's yet another adventure again to pursue her hard to figure out why that's gone and why this is here and why and it should be just a delight to dive into oh I don't understand this but but God's good the Holy Spirit's him he's going to make it clear I'm gonna dig I'm going to seek I'm gonna find Luther said when he was preparing to teach the book of Romans that he laid hold of Paul and beat him until he submitted that's how you read the Bible right there right like you read in Romans you like what you do in chapter 9 so Luther's like I grabbed hold of Paul beat him till he submitted okay like that's that's how you handle questions as you're reading the Bible now special rules let's go over special rules just real quickly parables parables look at parables teach one key truth they're not allegory they teach one truth so when you're reading a parable so let's just take one if you're reading the Good Samaritan you're not trying to figure out what the hotel is all about that he's staying in it's not the point of the parable right you know like oh how many coins did he pay what's the significance of that number if I take that number and I plug it back into Ezekiel and divide it by how many chapters are in Isaiah I know that the day the Lord is returning is this date that's not what we do a parable has a truth find it proverbs proverbs are principles they are not promises proverbs are principles they are not promises they're just principles to give yourself over to because God has designed life to work in such a way that those principles most often bring about this specific outcome but they are not promises you can't hold God in contempt for not delivering upon you taking a proverb and saying no God promised me this no no he's not he's not doing that he's giving you a principle of wisdom by which to live your life when it comes to poetry you need to examine the figurative language and the parallel structure to determine its meaning and also all Hebrew poetry the second line informs the first so if you're in old testament poetry right you're in song of solomon you're in part of job you're in Ecclesiastes the second line almost always brings clarity to the first line so you want to dive into the figurative in parallel languages and then look at the second line to help you interpret the first then you've got to know there's a lot of symbolism in the Bible you need to be prepared for symbolism because Jesus is the lamb the lion the rock the branch the root the stumbling block the Holy Spirit is water he is oil he is when he is a dove the these are symbols got to think rightly about prophecy in prophecy there's almost always almost always a near application and a far application so let's take Daniel and what I said earlier about understanding the the parables of the kingdom when Daniel is writing in exile under the reign of Nebuchadnezzar what he's writing has significant meaning for the people of that day but also for us there's a near application and a far meaning don't take the far meaning and reject the near application because there's truth in that near application the other thing to consider around prophecy is that a lot of prophecy is progressive it has been partially fulfilled but not fully fulfilled yet so we're in what we call the second advent right we're waiting for the second coming of Christ so this is interpretation what what does this passage mean when it was originally written interpret literally interpret in context interpret and view of history and culture interpret in light of the literary form scripture interprets Scripture and interpret in view of theological consistency now let me do this for time sake because we do want to answer some questions let me give you five minutes to to work through a little bit of interpretation on your John picking so you observe some things so now let's interpret some things what does it mean what's the significance of John 15 so answer those two questions what does it mean what is the significance of John 15 to the original here we'll get to you in a second this is Fast Five okay let's let's talk application because I know we want to go okay what do we do so that's application what do you do in light of what you comprehend it and then from there what you interpreted now the question is what shall I do so here's here's how I think effective application works and and I think this is the big issue in the Bible Belt I think one we don't know a lot like gin or what we do know is partial like gin described earlier in this you know it's the eight ball or the sand axe or you know we don't know a lot and then what we do know we don't apply and so it's the application that's going to make all the difference in our transformation and joy in the Lord so let's talk about that here's some things to consider on effective application this is a decision not an emotion is the step of faith uh the Word of God has bidden me in this direction and I'm going to take that step of faith which almost always requires a plan of action right you've got to go this is what the Word of God says this is what it means this is how I apply it this is my plan to apply it like or you're like what James wrote about the man who sees his face in the mirror but forgets about his face as soon as he walks away which leads to deceit and decay so what happens when we don't apply we walk in to see and we start to decay so there must be an effective plan to apply the word of God so even even as we started talking about studying the Word of God what did it mean you better have a time in a place you better have a plan or it's not going to happen it's not going to be you you you pile most people's lack of discipline with the level of spiritual warfare were unaware of you get a lot of people that's never going to read the Word of God and just trust whoever's in front of them and what they're saying obedience needs to take place over an appropriate period of time and if you like what's appropriate you need to be obedient as fast as you can be obedient right and the reason I wanted to put this here is because there are some conversations you shouldn't have over the phone there are some things that don't need to be handled via text with a cute gift they're face to face conversations that take a bit to set up and there are certain environments you need to be in if repentance is your step of obedience if confession is your step of obedience sometimes you need to find the spot to do that what I'm saying when I say an adequate time is you don't quit punting the ball down the field until you can numb yourself the of the conviction of the Holy Spirit needs to be complete not partial needs to be complete obedience not partial obedience complete obedience not partial obedience and and I'm just going to preach this until my voice gives out not tonight over the next 30 40 years if the Lord gives it to me this tract will be done in just a moment application is obedience and obedience brings joy obedience brings joy I'm just not going to stop saying everything God commands to do and not do is about his glory and your joy he knows what's best so to say yes to God is to line ourselves up according to Jesus with the fullest life possible that's what that's what we're being disciplined about life into the full are we going to take steps of obedience even when they hurt even when we lose faith even when the projection of strength vanishes in light of our humanity failure shortcoming lusts anger laziness what why do we step into the light what do we walk in obedience because joy is on the line eternal life is on the line and I'm going to step into it boldly believing that the day will come we'll all have no regrets the day will come when I have no regrets so really what we're talking about here is a higher level of hedonism than the world operates in what we're saying there's a greater pleasure to be had in full surrender to Jesus Christ then giving myself over to the longing of my stomach and I'm going to mine for treasure I'm going to find that treasure in the Word of God and I'm going to gladly and as best I can happily submit to that because there are some obediences that are difficult can we just agree on that like I feel like 80% of the stuff God's ever asked me to do I've been like that's awesome I'm in I can see it yes and then there's that dadgum 20% where I'm like I hope we don't get killed got a pregnant wife I'm moving to a church where everyone in my circle is saying they're going to destroy me or I'm going to destroy them I'm flipping through the Bible bone where is Highland Village First Baptist Church should I go I mean there's these steps of faith that we have to take sometimes there's not a lot of clear but we're trusting the heart and character of God that we've learned about in the word the stakes are unbelievably high here I'm more and more convinced that if we don't get serious about this which is why we do the Institute here now is why we're doing nights like this we are going to get washed away in a wave of fine-sounding arguments with no weapons by which to defend ourselves our enemies are smooth and the air we breathe has served as a kind of air war to soften the beach in ways we don't even comprehend the shows you watch the magazines you read the music you listen to is all disciple in you it's normalizing things that are abnormal and unnatural and we can't see it or feel it until there's an insane argument made and we're ill-equipped because we don't have the sword of the Spirit handy and we're swept away in deceit and decay so much is at stake here now I want to just part with this look at me you can do this look it's going to be clumsy if you haven't been doing this it's clumsy at first it's clumsy gonna be done like was that it supposed to do that yeah over and over and over and over again but what I found is it's men I can at times just get caught up and drawn in like I want to get back to study you know I'm done in the morning and I've got some meetings I gotta go to and things and then I kind of keep thinking about that thing that I saw I can't wait I need to figure that out I'm that's my personality I need to know how it work and then if I mess up diving back in it's just better than anything on Netflix it's just better than house of cards seven or whatever it is you're gonna have to do the spiritual warfare involved you're going to have to have a plan you're going to have to willing be willing to submit to what you see in the scriptures or you numb yourself and you get swept away so much more at stake and I think we even realize let me pray for us and then we'll move to Q&A Father I thank you for tonight just pray that be helpful and anything that's not helpful I just pray that as they leave this place they'd forget and we'll edit out it's gotta just ask that even as we move into a time of qat that some of the more practical aspects that men and women need to know to kind of figure out how this works we could bring those to life and thank you that you don't ever leave us or abandon us to our own devices thank you that you longed to speak with us to eat with us to dine with us to speak to us we thank you that you have not hidden the word just for some sort of intellectual elite but for all will believe and trust in the name of Jesus through your beautiful name I pray amen amen would you give Matt and Jenna round of applause so I've been excited to ask this question this is a question I asked myself some time so I'm going to direct this to Jen first amount of love for you to answer it - this is a question I would imagine many of us are asking so I'm new to this where do I start how do I know what to read let's just say it's Monday morning I sit down I open my Bible how do I decide or know what to read and study start with a bit ACCA's good rule general rule and know you're going to want to choose choose a book that's accessible I usually tell people to start with one of the shorter books in the New Testament and get your get your feet wet with it just the way the process works another way you might choose where to start is if your church is doing a sermon series over a book of the Bible follow along with that what's for example exits yes yeah so try to align with what your church is doing so that you're you know you're having multiple environments where you are encountering the text and then in terms of like what's the first thing you can do the most basic place to start is with repetitive reading from start to finish that's that's that's the first place to go yeah yeah I don't know that I'd answer anything different I I do love trying to read through the Bible in a year and and getting a reading plan that has both Old Testament and New Testament readings and and so maybe you don't like that because you want I don't know that's a great yeah so I like both there and then the other thing I would you know I would kind of just try to gently press on is if you could do this in community yeah that makes a world of difference so even like a church reading plan where you can reference to hey then maybe maybe you've been reading what we're reading here's what we've seen and this is what you should have read this week and that was pretty cool and so if you can do it as a home group or you can do it just to even as your family if you're reading the same things and then having dialogue about it that's really helpful yeah I would say one of the most common responses to a talk like this that I often get is oh great now I can go do this on my own and I always want to go wait no that wasn't the point the point is yes that you should be able to do this on your own and you should do this in community with people who are Co learners and then you should also sit under teaching this happens corporately and it happens individually and you need both so keep that intention that's great I imagine this has been is happen to many of us too sometimes you're sitting under a teacher perhaps that is almost making the Bible feel accessible to you like they're trying to to make it yeah I heard a quote once it's not as preachers make the Bible more riddle than revelation and you're like what did that you say I know it's going there so sometimes you have teachers who can make the Bible feel like this is inaccessible some of this by using technical language by using Greek words and so in so it's how how can we make the Bible accessible or how can we gain the proper tools perhaps like even just basic literary tools to understand how to read the Bible Jen I always like to remind people that the reason we have a Bible literacy crisis in the church is because we have a literacy crisis in our culture people don't just not know how to read the Bible they don't know how to read usually and I don't mean that they can't like read a sentence what I mean is they don't know that you would read any book for comprehension interpretation and application and so I point people back to hey we're asking you to utilize tools that you've probably learned in your high school English class and we're saying that if you will carry those to the text it is going to open it up to you as the author intended for you to read it yeah Maxon Gina um the only thing I would add is that we've tried to make it a goal in our family to make reading comprehension like a reward worthy effort and so the illustration I would use is for Audrey to get her phone when she wanted her phone I made her read a book on the effects of technology on the brain and the family dynamic and made her write for me I mean you can get how it sounds fun oh you really you want to do this Jen Wilkin do you forget I don't know you will talk that just my kids income up smoking a pipe rematch alright I have a trainer what kind of B was that component of the Byrds joke so we had Audrey read that book and then she had to write 12 sentence summaries of the chapters no fluff sentences so she couldn't about what she learned in that chapter so she couldn't ride I really liked that chapter I just drew a line through it that's not a real sentence what did you learn from the and then when she completed that we wrote up a contract and she got her phone but I could give a couple more examples where I'm just trying to get them to just know how to read something and tell me what they read and and then men we just take that right to the Bible I would say that what I see so often and particularly among women but not limited to women is that we approach the text wholly with our feelings we've forgotten how to have a thought level discussion around the text and so it's a real learning of a discipline of having that thought level discussion as though you were sitting in a classroom at school like can you imagine sitting in your maths classes and I just really feel like algebra is speaking to my soul today you know like no no no never mind a move you it may make you weep it certainly made me weep but but you start with you know let's have the thought level discussion so this is a question I'd like to ask and given what you just talked about bringing kind of families into this conversation so I have a two and a half year old son got a little girl on the way you guys have grown kids and growing kids how do you start including children into these kinds of kind of rhythms of comprehension interpretation and application apparently it is how she take their phone away do you really want to do this so you're like you know I have weekend all right go ahead oh yes so we we just started day one and and the Bible is just been a part of our world since day one and that it's looked different in various seasons and what I love about the resources that the village has done specifically that next gen thing is they've made all of that really really accessible and made me look super creative when I wasn't so building a fort in the living room and getting in and reading about the Lord being a strong tower and talking about what that means like I didn't do that I was just like on the sheet that I think of when I feel kids and and so we've done Advent together as a family we've done and all that resources that the church created that we're just getting and they helped us do that and so it's increased as they've gotten older and so right now Audrey is doing a Bible study with my wife and with a young woman who lives with us and so on Tuesday nights they head upstairs for two hours of walk and she's got homework she's got to do and the phone is on the line for that and and yeah so we it's increased as they've gotten older and the Bible's just - we talk about the Bible law we apply it a lot yeah I think the modeling piece was really important I remember one point Jeff realized that he was he was doing his time in the word at a time when the kids were not awake so he moved it to a time when they would see it and in my case I'm kind of always sitting around you know doing something related to that and so we never said hey you need to have a quiet time that's not our parenting style I think it's fine to do that that just wasn't our go-to we tried to model it and then we did have family devotional times where we would sit down and my version of that was a little too much and Jeff would say hey hey what if it just came with two observations and two questions I'm like well I mean you know no one's going to get a scholarship based on that but he was right it was to get was to draw them into a discussion you know there was a thought level discussion and honestly that that question-asking piece is huge because we kind of have this attitude of what's the Bible I can't ask a question about it right and so just to start in viewing into your children the idea that hey in order to think critically about what you're taking in you're going to have to ask questions and know that the text can bear your questions yeah that's really good I want to ask two more questions the first is this what is or if there is one a difference between devotional reading of the Bible and maybe more like an academic studious reading of the Bible is there a difference in what is the difference Matt can it Matt okay I'll take it I I want to study devotionally so that that's what I'm - answer the question I I think what you could probably get to is maybe you've got a shorter window in this season this week you've got a shorter season so your devotional study goes from an hour to 25 minutes or 20 minutes or 15 minutes and then you just got a little devotional going on there right so I I have never been the guy like I I was taught early on you need to have a devotional eyes and then you need to have a preaching study life and I just could not more categorically reject that yeah that means I'm approaching preaching as it was an academic exercise and I'm approaching the Bible and devotional life to feed my soul and and I'm not I want to study in a very devotional like man or needed to speak to me before I can tell everybody else this is what's going on here yeah how do you handle that I totally agree with that that's been my experience too if people want to know yeah but like what you know they think those are two separate things and they're not for me study leads to devotion but I do think we should acknowledge there is a category of in the publishing world known as devotional material and I think you all know what it is and it's not it's not bad by definition although can we just be frank a lot of it is very bad it's just it's just kind of maudlin but devotional material has its place like say you want to do a devotional study over the course of Lent right so that's great I'll tell you this though it's going to mean a lot more to you if you understand the context of each of the passages is being pulled in for you to have your devotional time with and you're going to be able to determine then in that case which devotional materials are the better ones and which are the less good because you have the foundational understanding of Scripture of them I want to be sensitive your time but I do want to ask one more question to both of you so we've now talked about the problem of biblical literacy why this is such an important deal in the life of the church across church history but even kind of more acutely today because some of the problems were facing we talked a little bit about how we can approach this problem but I love to hear and for you to have an opportunity to share each of you so so what's next like if you can kind of give us a charge or a so what should we do now that we walk out the doors help us it takes time to grow in comfort with with these processes and so if you wanted to learn how to play the piano you might try to self teach yourself using a youtube video but you would probably go find someone who can help you and the first time you practice you would not be good and you would hate yourself and say you're a and not want to go back but if you went back and you did it again and again and again over time you would develop an attitude so I would urge you that while you're in the stage of feeling how much you don't know the extent of what you don't know and I don't know that you ever leave that behind but you know at the outset and get yourself somewhere that can provide you some structure and some accountability and and and in the village we do that through classes we have the Bible classes the men's and women's Bible classes which are going to take the principles you just heard not to talk about and they're going to they're going to helping you put them into practice so what they're not going to do is tell you how to interpret the text they're going to ask you to start using the tools or help you begin to unpack it because that way when you sit under teaching in those classes you've already spent time and attacks you will hear teaching so differently when you have spent time in the text first so try to get yourself into an environment you know if you wanted to become a doctor you would go get some training if you want it this is it this is a form of training and so we've built out environments to help you with that and many local churches have if you're not from the village you can you know seek out those opportunities yeah yes and amen - every word there this is where I'll I'll go you need to look at your phone after we dismiss find 30 minutes tomorrow where you can get alone all by yourself just you you should probably tomorrow turn your phone on airplane mode go tactile get an actual Bible an actual journal not I would not come to myself with my iPad until you detox a little bit and then I would spend 30 minutes reading or out spent 15 minutes reading the Gospel of John at the end of that 15 minutes I would stop and then I would go back and read wherever you got to again and then 30 minutes of reading the the Gospel of John I would think through some of the stuff that we just walked through like like what we just walked through that that's not it happens a lot more quickly so you just start with 30 minutes long hopping the Gospel of John but that means when we're done here you need to find that 30 minutes you will not find it tomorrow you will find tomorrow's 30 minutes tonight and so you find that block it 30 minutes Gospel of John dive in I've already said it'll be a little clumsy you might finish and think is that it and here's what I want to encourage you the next day find another 30 minutes you don't have to start at an hour you don't you let's just start to crawl and stumble and and Men when you come across that text bit every stream of evangelical life has a word for what's happened illumination it jumped off the page the charismatic said I got a word and you you just take that and and then write on it and go back and read it again and let's just dive into the Gospel of John if you're not doing anything right now find thirty minutes Gospel of John dive in clumsily move forward last when your wife or husband lasso in some group leaders group members some friends I need to get better this I'm terrible if you if you've got that projection of strength going on stop it right like it's okay if you don't know the Bible just say I don't know the Bible like I'm pretending to I'm just regurgitating stuff I've heard I want to stop that will you help me stop that you're going to experience the grace of God through another Saint who will say oh my gosh me too let's read John and then dive into John thirty minutes tomorrow you're going to find that thirty minutes tonight you won't find it tomorrow Gospel of John amen hey thanks again for coming hope it's been helpful and beneficial for you yeah thank you guys let me just wrap up by thanking the Lord for the time praying for us and then you'll be dismissed father we again we're grateful for this we're grateful that you have done one of the most imaginable things possible you have made yourself known to us in the scriptures and for that we could not be more grateful help us to be a people who just devour them who consumed them and love them that we might be shaped and formed and transformed into the image of Christ by them let us treat Scripture as what it is you speaking to us I pray that every single person in here would just have an overwhelming desire and passion to know you better tomorrow than they did today and that passion would continue for the rest of their lives we're grateful that you love us and that you care for us in Christ that in him we see the fullness of God and in him we've experienced reconciliation redemption and the forgiveness of sins we pray these things in his name and by the spirit amen thank you

Channel: The Village Church Resources

Views: 132,260

Rating: 4.8373303 out of 5

Keywords: Matt Chandler, The Village Church, Know Your Bible, The Bible, Forums, Jen Wilkin, JT English

Id: Moulqq-h-d8

Length: 111min 55sec (6715 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 14 2017