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Four Suggestions for Understanding the Bible
1. The Bible reveals God Himself speaking through His chosen prophets. All of history is
His story! But the Bible is His chosen method of revelation of Himself to mankind! It is
unlike any other book or collection of books! It is rightly named the Holy Bible, which
means the collection of books set apart by God for God’s own purposes!
2. Get hold of a Bible translated into your own best contemporary language which
you can understand easiest. There are now several good ones in English. And, unless
you are a scholar of Bible era Greek, there is no better way for you to begin!
3. Even though we study the Bible using our mind, the Bible can't be fully understood
just mentally or intellectually. It can only be fully comprehended spiritually! The Bible
is God revealing Himself to men’s spirits (their “hearts”), progressively over the centuries,
starting with the writings of the prophets of old, through the short period of time when He
actually walked the earth as a man, and including the present time since His Holy Spirit
was “poured out upon all mankind.” It is imperative and correct that we ask God to lead
us into the truths of the Bible by His Spirit. Our spirits – our innermost selves -- must be
led by His Spirit But, GOOD NEWS! He promises to quicken our spirits to understanding
when we ask Him to!
4. Jesus Christ, the central character and subject of the whole Bible, isn’t fully
revealed until nearly the last fourth of it! The first three-fourths of the Bible is called the
Old Testament, which mostly describes God’s relationship with a people called Israel; and
it is very much worth reading and studying. But the Old Testament by itself leaves us with
unexplained ceremonies, unachieved purposes, unappeased longings, and unfulfilled
prophecies. Expecting to find these unexplained ceremonies, unachieved
purposes, unappeased longings and unfulfilled prophecies will make the Old
Testament less bewildering! But then expecting to discover that the New
Testament is the fulfillment of the Old can make them both more exciting! Jesus
Christ explains those unexplained ceremonies; Jesus Christ achieves the
unachieved purposes; Jesus Christ appeases the unappeased longings; and
Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the unfulfilled prophecies!
5. I suggest to anyone just beginning to study the Bible that they should not
begin at the beginning at all! Instead, I recommend they read through the Gospel
of John, then Luke and then Acts, to first-of-all learn Who Jesus Christ is and
what He and His Spirit did in the beginning of the church. Even before that, read
and meditate upon the following two brief passages from the opening verses of
the Gospel of John and of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which speak of Jesus
Christ and contain the foundational keys to understanding the whole Bible:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He
was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him
nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And
the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. …That was the
true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world. He was in the world, and
the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own,
and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right
to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of
blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became
flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the
Father, full of grace and truth.”
“In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in
various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed
heir of all things, and through whom He created the universe. The Son is the radiance of
God’s glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by his powerful
Word.”
Reading and meditating on just these two passages is a great way to build the
best foundation for understanding the whole Bible!
Jerusalem Hill's Bible Primer
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