How To Study The Bible - Week 4 Session 1

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. (2 Timothy 3:16–17)

Before the tools come the questions—how do we hear God rightly, and how do we read an ancient word as a word for us today?

How Do I Know If God Is Speaking to Me?

Questions come to me throughout the week, and one that came through was: how do I know if what I think God is speaking to me is really the Lord? That's a really good question. We come across things in Scripture, or in prayer we get some impression or thought, and my general rule is always to test that against the Scriptures. The Scriptures will validate or invalidate what we think may be the word of the Lord to us.

Peter says no prophecy of Scripture ever came about by any private interpretation. So we need to be careful with what we are sensing in prayer or as we meditate on the Word, and seek to validate or invalidate that word through the Scriptures. God will also confirm a word through the fellowship of the body of Christ, through other brothers and sisters, and through good teaching—but primarily we go to the Scriptures. Nothing God speaks to you in the secret place of the closet will contradict His word.

Can an Old Testament Passage Be a Word to Me?

Another question came up two or three times this past week: can I take a passage like Isaiah 51, written to Israel, as a word to me? It's important that we look at any passage—Old or New Testament—trying to determine what the original author was saying to the original audience. We'll get into this more next week with inductive Bible study. But there are also general principles we can draw out.

Consider 2 Chronicles 7:14: "If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray to me and seek me, then I will hear from heaven and heal their land." Contextually this is spoken to Solomon at the consecration of the temple, specifically to the children of Israel as a nation. Yet there's a general principle here, and it actually comes straight out of Moses' teaching in Deuteronomy.

Why We Are Studying Deuteronomy

This is part of why we've been working through Deuteronomy as a church. When we finished our New Testament studies—using Acts as a roadmap—I wanted an Old Testament book that would serve as a foundation for studying the rest. Deuteronomy is that book, because nearly everything afterward—Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Samuel, and all the prophets—looks back to Deuteronomy and filters Israel's history through what God said He would do.

When we reach Deuteronomy 28, we'll see the blessings and curses of the law, and that's exactly what God is reiterating to Solomon in 2 Chronicles 7:14. It's not new revelation; it's a restatement of what God already said through Moses centuries before. The same is true when you read Isaiah 51. Isaiah is one of my favorite Old Testament books, but without a working knowledge of Israel's history in Kings and Chronicles, and of Deuteronomy, Isaiah will be obscure and hard to understand.

This is why it takes many years to unlock books like Jeremiah, Isaiah, or Ezekiel. Don't expect to grasp everything on the first read. I've taught Isaiah seven times at the Bible college, and every time I'd go through it again and find connections I hadn't seen before. As you build your internal bookshelf by reading the whole Bible, things become clearer. It's like an eye exam—at first everything is fuzzy, then they drop in the right lens and suddenly you can see clearly.

Drawing General Principles Faithfully

Look for the general principles in a passage. Take Jeremiah 1:5, where God says, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you... I ordained you a prophet to the nations." Is there a principle for us? Yes—God knew who you were before He created you, and He created you with a purpose. Paul says in Ephesians 2 that God created us for good works which He ordained beforehand that we should walk in them. But is God calling you, John, to be a prophet to the nations? That's a stretch from that passage.

In over twenty years of pastoral ministry, I've had people quote that verse to insist they're a prophet. My answer is always, "God bless you as you go to a different church." A prophet always has a word for you, and my reply is, "Well, I haven't heard that from the Lord, so it's okay."

Christians also love Jeremiah 29:11: "I know the thoughts I think toward you... thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope." That is spoken specifically to Israel 2,500 years ago, but there are general principles in the whole passage—and you can't divorce that one verse from its context. Always read the verses before and after. That passage also has a condition: "You will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart." We can validate that in the New Testament—seek and you will find, knock and it will be opened. So look for the general principles, and then draw application from them. Always read the Old Testament first asking, as Gordon Fee emphasizes, what the original author intended for the original reader.

Why This Class—and What It's For

Why this class? That we might learn to access the Scriptures ourselves, in order to make them accessible to others. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is useful—one English translation says profitable. P-r-o-f-i-t, not p-r-o-p-h-e-t. You want to profit from the Word so it begins to do the work God desires in your life, producing fruit.

I cannot accentuate this enough: the primary thing we want is a sanctifying transformation, God using His Word to transform our thinking, which filters down into our behavior. If we're not growing in the fruit of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, kindness, gentleness, self-control—then we're doing it wrong. If you're just getting a fat head and not a bigger heart, you're doing it wrong.

As a pastor I have to step back and check this too. One occupational hazard is studying the Bible only to prepare another study. I've taught at a Bible college a long time, and I warn new students: the real danger is getting into the routine of doing Bible study for homework and laying aside your devotional time with the Lord—and your time at college becomes a dry, desert-like experience for your soul. We want our knowledge to overflow into greater worship, a stronger relationship with God, and greater love for people. Jesus said all the law and prophets hang on loving God and loving your neighbor.

A Mirror for the Soul

The fruit of the Spirit is a mirror. Am I increasing in love, joy, peace, kindness, gentleness, patience, self-control? Patience and self-control are the hardest ones for me, and I'm sure I'm not alone. In this season we've all been through, watching the news—the economy, OPEC, the election, Ukraine—you can quickly lose your peace and your joy. If you find yourself there, increase your intake of this (the Bible) and decrease your intake of that (the media).

Think of it like the low-fuel light on your dashboard. If you're lacking joy, peace, love, or self-control, increase the Word and decrease Fox News, MSNBC, CNN, or sports. It's 100 percent directly related. Over the last three years I've encouraged many people to fast from social media or corporate media, and it's incredibly helpful.

Review: Devotional and Purposeful Study

All Scripture is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness, so that the man or woman of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work—the good works God created us for in Ephesians 2:10.

In devotional Bible study we look for two things: truths to believe and truths to obey—doctrines and commands. Use the TIPS model: T, identify the truths to believe and obey; I, inspect or evaluate yourself in light of those truths—do I believe this, do I do this?; P, pray and plan to obey; S, obey with the Spirit's help.

In purposeful Bible study we read with purpose, looking at a passage through the lens of simple questions established before we begin. It's like reading comprehension in school—simple questions whose answers are right in the text. This week's homework was Isaiah 51, viewed through two questions: What is God like? How does God treat us? We're looking for general principles, guarding against the temptation to turn it into a rabbit hunt for cross-references and end-times speculation—Vladimir Putin, the Bible Code, prophecies about 2022. Slow down, narrow your focus, and zero in on the objective.

The Power of the Simple Word

People who've been Christians for ten, twenty, thirty years and have read the Bible many times have written to me saying this simple process—looking for truths to believe and obey, or reading through the lens of a couple questions—has revolutionized their understanding after just a couple weeks. If you make this a habit, it will change your life, because this book is living and powerful and transforms you by the renewing of your mind.

I'll never forget, before I pastored this church, a man called me in crisis on a Wednesday afternoon. His young son was being brought to our church by a neighbor, and now he and his wife wanted to talk because of a marital crisis—there had been infidelity, and their life was in chaos. I shared the gospel, their need for God's forgiving grace, and led them in prayer. Then I gave them a Bible and said, "Read Ephesians—a chapter a day, after praying that God would help you understand."

The next Wednesday they came back full of questions. In Ephesians 5 they read, "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church," and that wives should respect their husbands, and that they should not be drunk with wine. They told me, "We think we might be drinking too much—should we stop?" I said that would probably be a good idea. That was simply God's Word working in their lives. They later moved to Orange County for work and are still walking with the Lord and serving in a church, because God's Word is true and the Holy Spirit is real.

Don't Lose the Simplicity

Tonight we move to tools beyond a Bible, pen, and paper—but don't get away from simply spending devotional time in the Scriptures. This morning, after getting the kids to school, I made coffee, opened to 2 Thessalonians 3, and got through all of three verses, writing a few pages of devotional thoughts. It was refreshing—God speaking to specific things I've been wrestling with, straight from a passage I've read dozens of times and taught multiple times. Tomorrow I'll open back up and go to the next few verses, slowly. As we look at tools to go deeper or cross-reference, don't miss the simplicity of going through Scripture verse by verse.

By the way, I looked through most of your homework from last week, and it's great. I can tell some of you were worried you'd give the wrong answer—that's okay; I don't expect you to understand everything. But probably more than 75 percent of what I saw was right on the money.

Amateurs and Pros: It's About the Tools

We've all heard the terms amateur and pro. Graphic design and photography have been hobbies of mine for years, and I'm nowhere near a pro. But the major difference between an amateur and a professional isn't that the pro makes money—it's that the pro understands their tools far better.

Open Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator and most people would be lost, afraid to click anything. A professional knows not only the tools but all the keyboard shortcuts, and can do in five minutes what would take you five years. A professional photographer doesn't even need all the filters—they use aperture and f-stops in the camera to get what an amateur tries to fix later in software. The same is true in carpentry, working on cars, or cooking—the cook on YouTube who throws in a tablespoon without measuring because they know their craft. Understanding the tools and how to use them effectively is the major distinction. And it's the same in unlocking the Scriptures.

A Word About Logos—and a Word First About You

One tool I won't spend much time on is Logos, the tool of choice for most Bible teachers, scholars, seminarians, and professors. It has layer upon layer of tools the average person would never need, and people spend a lot of money on its resources. I use it regularly because I know how to use it. But what I'll show you tonight are basic tools that are freely available and don't cost thousands of dollars, which every one of you can and should use.

Before we even get to the tools, it's vital that you discover how you best put your thoughts down on paper. Many who went to school over the last 25–30 years were taught one way—the Harvard outline: Roman numeral one, letter A, number one, and so on. That works for some, but not for everybody, and for more than a few of you it was completely unhelpful and you were forced to do it anyway.

Find the Note-Taking Method That Fits Your Brain

I've shared this content dozens of times, and every time someone tells me, "You just unlocked my brain." Everybody thinks differently. I have dyslexia, which for a long time made it hard to get my thoughts down in a way that made sense. Over time I've come to like a hybrid—an expanded Harvard outline mixed with a manuscript where I write out full thoughts as I'd speak them.

One way is to write out your thoughts in long form like a manuscript. Another is short bullet points or quick blurbs to help you recall. But another way, which doesn't work for me yet helps about a quarter of the people I talk with, is mind mapping. It starts with a central idea, then radiates outward like a clock—12 o'clock, one o'clock, two o'clock—with each subsection branching further. I found mind maps online for the Spirit in Acts, for the Ten Commandments, all sorts of things. For me it looks like a jumbled mess, but for some people, whose brains are a jumbled mess, it's exactly how they think. There's even an application—it used to be called iMindMap—where you build the map and push a button to turn it into an outline.

From mind maps you can move to sketch notes. I once photographed a student's notes from my Isaiah 30 class in 2014—it looked like a comic-book page, and if you glanced at it you'd think they weren't paying attention. But they were keeping notes through drawing. I've seen people sketch-note an entire multi-day conference on an iPad, capturing everything that happened on a single canvas. There's a whole community online sharing sketch notes on Instagram.

Tools for Visual Thinkers

A resource I recommend is the Bible Project at bibleproject.com. They've created one-sheet outlines for every book of the Bible and for whole theological concepts—Philippians, Colossians, Isaiah—mapped left to right across the page. I don't agree with all their doctrinal positions, especially around Reformed theology, but the visual material is spectacular, and their YouTube videos walk through each book in about ten minutes, showing the major themes and verses.

These are essentially sketch notes, and for artistically minded people this is how they think—they hear someone speak and see pictures. My daughter Addison is like this; when she can't articulate her feelings, I tell her to draw a picture, and she puts it all down beautifully. We should be grateful for iconographers. Many people in the eras that produced Europe's great cathedrals and stained glass were illiterate, and their only understanding of Scripture came through those images—which is the origin of illuminated Bibles, with the text in the middle and pictures of the story all around.

So begin by determining the best way for you to get on paper what's in your heart and mind—manuscript, outline, mind map, sketch note, or picture. It doesn't matter if it differs from your spouse or friend; if you can explain why it's there, use it. Forcing everyone to do it one way isn't wise, because we're not all the same.

Learn to Type

The next helpful tool is learning to type. Some of you say, "Forget it, I'm not doing that," but I've typed as my primary way of putting thoughts down since high school, and now I can type three or four times faster than I can write. Sometimes I deliberately slow down and grab a favorite pen and notebook to think more clearly, but eventually I get to the computer and can produce quickly.

This is essential because my notes from last Sunday were about 4,600 words, and on an average week I have between four and seven thousand words of notes for a single message. Writing all that by hand—and editing it—would be very hard. Even if you feel you couldn't do it, learning to type increases the speed at which you work. At the Bible college it's basically a standard; without it you'll be lost. I'm pleased my kids started learning to type in second grade and now use Google Docs, Pages, and Word effectively, making presentations by third and fourth grade. These days schools would rather you know how to type than write in cursive.

Study Bibles

The next tool is study Bibles. I bought four versions—the New King James, the Christian Standard Bible, the New International Version, and the English Standard Version. The retail price on one is $54.99, but it's on Amazon right now for about $32. On many trips to Africa and Asia to teach pastors, our group fills a suitcase with these to give away, because this tool is invaluable—worth far more than the price. It's filled with outlines, commentary, and articles on all kinds of subjects, not just the scriptural text. These run roughly $28 to $40, and many pastors throughout China, Asia, and Africa would practically die to have one.

That said, I still highly recommend a simple reader Bible that you go through slowly with paper and pen, devotionally or purposefully. It's easy to get lost in all the extra material in a study Bible—great articles, commentary, and illustrations that aren't the Bible itself and can distract.

Free Online Tools

After the break we'll look at Blue Letter Bible (blueletterbible.com, blb.com, or .org). I have the privilege of serving on its board for about five years now. It was put together by Jim Milligan and Frank Rabinovich, who were in the tech industry during the dot-com boom and got out before the bust. Frank has a mind that freaks you out—he does complex math in his head—and they built this site, which gets hundreds of millions of page views a week, billions annually, from people all over the world. It's completely free, with an app for phones and tablets. For at least ten years it was my primary study tool, and it became my default when I moved to Germany and no longer had my physical resources.

I'll also briefly show you Logos, available online, as a desktop app for Windows and Mac, and on phones and tablets. Some of it is free, but most is costly—I've probably spent six thousand dollars on it over the years. That's my work, so it's worth it, but you don't need all that.

Another tool is Enduring Word (enduringword.com), whose board I also serve on and whose website I built. It now gets between 10 and 20 million page views a month worldwide and contains the Bible commentary of Pastor David Guzik, who has spoken here. Finally, there's Precept Austin (preceptaustin.org), built by a pastor in Texas who made it his passion to gather resources from across the internet into one free place. The amount of work is astounding—I don't know if the man ever sleeps. Groups have offered to buy it for millions, and he keeps it free.

We'll take about a ten-minute break, during which you can look at these Bibles up front. Afterward I'll open Blue Letter Bible and we'll walk through the tools and how to use them—because having the tools is one thing, but knowing what to do with them is another, and unless someone shows you, you won't know. So, a ten-minute break, and then we'll look at this tool.