Read The Bible For Correction And Equipping
We can live in victory because the Bible is cutting out all that is not of God and replacing it with things that actually help us overcome. Letting God correct us by reading the Bible leaves room for Him to equip us. Reading the Bible gives us everything we need each day to be victorious!
“All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work.” 2 Timothy 3:16-17
Fourth Do You Feel Weak Against The Crafty Schemes Of The Devil The Bible Helps Us Stand Strong Against His Schemes
John Piper sums this point up perfectly when he writes, Scripture enables me to hit the devil in the face with a force he cannot resist, and so protect myself and my family from his assaults.
Do you remember when Jesus was tempted in the wilderness by the devil? How did he shut the devils deceptive mouth? The Word of God!
The devil wants to steal our joy and create chaos in our lives and anxiety in our hearts by misleading us to believe his lies. So how do we counter his crafty schemes? The Word of God is our defense against the devil.
Discover The Power Of God’s Word
Dan Buttafuoco, an attorney in New York City, is president of the Historical Bible Society. He has written this powerful description of why we need to be reading Scripture every day.
The Bible is the single most important book ever written. It is an eyewitness account of historical events of such magnitude that they have literally shaped the world in which we live. Without this book the Western world and a good deal of the Eastern world would be completely different today than if the events of this book had never occurred.
It is not too much to say that the events recorded in this book are claimed by a significant percentage of people who have ever lived on this earth to be the most important events ever recorded in the history of the world. This book is foundational to just about everything mankind will ever know or accomplish. It has directly led to massive undertakings of good will and charity. Because of this book, great projects have been undertaken, hospitals have been built, multitudes fed and clothed and orphanages founded.
Here are five primary reasons why you need to read the Bible. This article was written by Dan Buttafuoco, president of the Historical Bible Society.
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It Teaches Us How To Praise God
When most Christians think of praise, they think of singing along to Hillsong covers in church. This is largely because the book of Psalms is an anthology of hymns and poetry and partly because singing happy songs on Sunday makes our hearts warm and fuzzy.
Because most modern Christian worship comes from happy source material, believers forget that not all praise comes from a joyful place. Jobs love for God cost him everything, some of the psalms are desperate cries for help, and Ecclesiastes is a mope-fest about how meaningless life is.
Job, Psalms, and Ecclesiastes are quite different from each other, but they serve the same purpose: To acknowledge God as savior not in spite of hardship and suffering, but because of it.
Without these less-than-cheery Old Testament writings, we wouldnt know that pain can and should be harnessed for praise. We would only be able to praise God when we were happy.
The Bible Convicts Us Of Sin And Warns Us Against Rebelling
The Bible encourages us to live righteous lives by showing us the serious consequences of sin and rebellion. Thankfully, it also teaches us about the grace of God and the forgiveness he offers when we turn from sin and ask for his forgiveness.
The Bible deals with our hearts as well as our outward actions.
For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
What do you think?
11. Sometimes we are mainly concerned about whether our actions are good or bad. Hebrews 4:12 says Gods word judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Why is it important for our thoughts and attitudes to be judged?
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Read The Bible Because It’s Freedom
If we feel oppressed by thoughts or limited by our own attitudes, the Bible is Truth. And once we know the truth about who we are in Christ by reading the Bible, we will live in the freedom God has given us as His children and co-heirs with Christ. Romans 8:17 Read the Bible and walk in complete freedom!
“And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. John 8:32
Reasons To Study The Bible And 7 Excuses We Make
The Bible is the worlds best-selling book, has been translated into over 200 languages, and is the foundational text of Western civilization. When we look at the life transformation this book has had on a global scale, our attention should peak.
So why does Bible study feel so difficult? To overcome this perception, we need to refresh ourselves on some key reasons why digging deeply into Gods Word is so essential, combat excuses, and see that Bible study is a doable, worthy, and awesome pursuit.
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Our Utter Failure To Keep Gods Law Should Drive Us To The Gospel For Salvation
Paul has been laying the foundation for this point from 1:18 through 3:20. We will study it in 3:21-28, but briefly notice : But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe. As he goes on to say , we are justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. Thats the greatest news in the world: Even though we are all guilty of breaking Gods Law, He offers a pardon to all that trust in Jesus and His substitutionary death on the cross!
Kids Bible Lesson Why Do We Study The Bible
Who knows why we go to school? Why do we study all those books that they give us? To get a good job, to learn what we need to know.
When you come to church, we also study a book. What book do we study? The Bible.
Who knows why we study the Bible?
The Bible is even more important than our school books because it tells us about God and Jesus. It tells us about how God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit love us and all the things that They have done for us and it tells us not how we can get a good job, but how we can be saved and go to Heaven when we die. It tells us how we are supposed to live our lives now. It tells us what kind of people God wants us to be and the kinds of things that He wants us to do.
Those are pretty important things, arent they? Thats why study the Bible to learn all those things.
Show students a popular childrens fiction book and ask, Who can tell me who wrote this book?
Now show them the Bible and ask, Who can tell me who wrote this book?
More than 40 people wrote the Bible, people like Moses and King David and Peter and Paul. It is a collection of books, a big book made up of a lot of smaller books. There are 66 books in the Bible. But those 40 different people werent just making up the Bible from their own ideas, were they? They werent just making up a story like this fiction book, right?
The people who wrote the Bible were writing true things, things that really happened. And they were writing the things that God gave them the idea to write about.
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It Preserves And Passes On The History Of God Saving His People
Anyone who skims the Old Testament can see that despite being Gods chosen people, the Israelites made a lot of mistakes. Like, a lot.
For example, despite seeing God plague Egypt , part the Red Sea , and dump the aforementioned sea back on top of their persecutors , the Israelites got antsy during Mosess time on Mount Sinai and thought to themselves, This God isnt the real deal. Lets worship a shiny cow instead .
This was neither the first nor the last of Israels blunders, and God made sure the Bibles authors didnt leave out a single one. But what does God do after the Israelites get it wrong yet again? He saves them. He saves them every single time.
Without the Old Testament, you and I wouldnt know half of what God has done to save the Israelites our spiritual ancestors from themselves.
We also wouldnt understand the theological or cultural roots the New Testament, in general, and the gospel, in particular, stemmed from. And where would we be if we didnt know the gospel?
Why Does This Matter
If you forget everything else about this article, remember this: The New Testament tells us about the reason for our hope, but the Old Testament tells us what God did to give that hope to us.
The more of it we read, the more we understand and appreciate the lengths He has gone to for sinful, stubborn, silly people like us who dont deserve it.
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What Is The Author Trying To Do What Literary Forms And Conventions Are They Using
When we interpret a passage, first we have to identify what an author is trying to do. Sometimes authors want to tell what happened or will happen sometimes they want to explain or describe something sometimes they want to give instructions about how to do something and sometimes they want to give an exhortation or command.
All languages and cultures have ways of communicating these kinds of intentions. However, languages and cultures embed these intentions in different literary forms. These literary forms have certain conventions or rules that people within a certain culture and time recognize and easily interpret. But moving from one culture to another, from one time to another, or from one language to another, we may find that both the literary forms and the conventions within the forms are different than what we expect or easily recognize.
The literary forms and conventions associated with the ancient Hebrew psalms, a fifteenth-century Japanese haiku, an eighteenth-century English sonnet, and a twenty-first-century American rap song are very different, even though all could be classified as poetry.
Know Gods Truth So Our Lives Honor And Please Him
The Bible shows us how to measure success its not fame and riches, like the world tells us and to clearly see what matters. When we build our lives solidly on Jesus, the world cant manipulate us with its shifting views of truth. The Bible is still applicable to our modern lives because Gods nature and standards do not change. The ten commandments are as relevant now as they were two thousand plus years ago. Treating others with kindness is still in fashion with God, and always will be. His greatest commandment? Love God and love others.
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It Will Bless You When Its Principles Are Kept And Applied
The Word of God will never be able to accomplish its desired effect in our lives unless we apply to our lives what we have received. By default, not doing so causes us to be the dreaded hearers of the Word, and not doers . Rather we should continue to look into the Wordand that with purpose:
But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in itnot forgetting what they have heard, but doing itthey will be blessed in what they do .
In closing, how you view the Word of God will determine the place that it holds in your life. The Bible should not be consigned as just good literature, or a great read. It is not simply a book of short stories or even a history book of sorts. All of these ideas are far from the actual truth. The Bible is the unerring, infallible, unchanging, and ever living Word of God. The very same people who refer to God as the man upstairs, are the same people who refer to the Bible as the good book. But it is so much more!
These final words from the psalmist serve to show us all we need to understand about Gods Word and why we need to devote ourselves to its study:
Is this your heart? Lets remove every obstacle that prevents us from accomplishing this very undervalued component to our life in the Lord.
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God Gave The Law To Reveal His Standard Of Absolute Righteousness
When you tell people that they have sinned against the holy God, you will often hear, God knows that Ive done the best that I could. I believe in the Ten Commandments and the Golden Rule. I try to live by the Sermon on the Mount. They seem to think that if you try to do your best, even if you fail thousands of times, God will let you off on judgment day. He will reward your effort, not penalize your failures. Besides, if He demanded perfection, no one could be saved! Precisely!
But James 2:10 points out, For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. We dont like to admit this, but if you think about it, you have to admit it. If a man stole your credit card and used it to buy thousands of dollars of purchases, he is guilty of stealing. What would you think if, when he came to trial, he argued, But judge, I didnt commit adultery with his wife? I didnt steal his car or burn down his house. I didnt lie to him. I didnt molest his children. And, besides, I try to live by the Golden Rule. I do the best that I can. All of that is irrelevant to the main issue: Did you steal his credit card and use it to buy thousands of dollars of goods? If so, he is guilty in spite of all the other bad things he didnt do and in spite of all the good things that he may be doing. Hes a law-breaker.
Lets look for a moment at the absolute righteousness of Gods Law , which gives us the knowledge of sin .
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Why Should I Read The Bible
The Bible is a sacred writing, a gift given to us by our Creator so we can know Him in a personal way. In his bestselling book Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God, Henry Blackaby says, God speaks through a variety of means. In the present God primarily speaks by the Holy Spirit through the Bible, prayer, circumstances, and the church.
Although we can hear from God in a number of ways, we most clearly discern His voice through reading His Word. Tragically, though, this priceless treasure is often overlooked and undervalued. Instead of being opened with enthusiasm, the Bible often sits untouched on a shelf, collecting dust. Its pages remain in pristine condition, rather than worn and torn from frequent use.
If the Bible is supposed to be our handbook for holy living, why do so many believers neglect it?
What Was The Cultural Background Of The Original Audience
To take the Bible seriously, we also need to consider whom the author was writing to: the Bible was written for us, but not to us. Cultural norms, symbolism, and the audiences familiarity with Scripture may all contribute to the way in which Scripture has been written and understood. For example, the long lifespans of the patriarchs in the Old Testament likely had greater symbolic significance to the ancient Hebrews than we currently understand. The ages are all multiples of five with seven or fourteen added occasionally, suggesting a rhetorical meaning.
An example of cultural significance in the New Testament is found in the story of the prodigal son as described in Luke 15. A straightforward reading of the parabledisregarding the contextteaches us about the love and forgiveness of a father toward his son, and consequently about Gods love toward his children. However, when the story is considered in its cultural framework, the reading is much more profound.
According to New Testament scholar Kenneth Bailey, the Jewish son not only acted disgracefully by asking for his inheritance, but he further debased himself by squandering it. The sons behavior warranted a Kezazah, or cutting off ceremony, upon his return.1 This ceremony would have included rejection by the village and an angry confrontation by his father. Furthermore the son would have had to beg for permission to train for a job in the next village.
Sermon on the Mount , chromolithograph, published 1886.
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Read The Bible: It Contains Gods Will For Our Lives
What is Gods will for my life? There is no Bible verse that explicitly tells us what profession to pursue, where to live or whom to marry. But, nonetheless, the Bibles exhortations, guidelines, commandments and encouragement give us very concrete and infallible insight into Gods will for us in every aspect of life.
Paul writes that All Scripture is given by inspiration of God 2 Timothy 3:16. In some translations it even says that Scripture is God-breathed.
Have you ever thought about this? The Bible is inspired by God Himself! It is His Word, containing His wisdom, His goodness, His intentions, His judgements, His heart. Have you been so interested in understanding Gods will that you spend time with His very own Word?