Knowable Word - Bible study help

The Importance of Context, Part 1

December 6, 2012 By Peter Krol

“Pinky, are you pondering what I’m pondering?”

“I think so, Brain, but Lederhosen won’t stretch that far.”

The cartoon Animaniacs got a lot of mileage out of this joke. The two mice would find themselves in a pickle of one sort or another. Brain, the genius, would intuit a solution and ask his famous question. Pinky, the dolt, would take him out of context and say something so ridiculous that the joke never got old.

The joke isn’t funny, though, when Christians live it out in their Bible study.

Do you know what Jesus was talking about when he said, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am among them” (Matt 18:20, ESV)? Hint: it wasn’t about prayer groups. If you pray alone, Jesus is still with you (Matt 6:6, 28:20). Observe the context in Matt 18:15-20.

Who was God assuring when he said, “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope” (Jer 29:11)? Hint: it wasn’t Christians who were struggling with a big decision. Observe the context in Jer 29:1-3.

What did Paul intend by his infamous “Love chapter” in 1 Corinthians 13:1-13? Hint: it was a rebuke, not a Hallmark card. Observe the context in 1 Cor 11:17; 12:31b; 14:20, 40.

Every Bible passage has a context. If we lift individual verses from their context, we endanger interpretation. At best, we might still hit on biblical truth; we just look foolish to the watching world when they see that a passage doesn’t mean what we think it means. At worst, we run into error, heresy, or unbelief, or we lead others into those things. Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons use the Bible to support their doctrines, too.

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Bored with the Bible?

December 4, 2012 By Peter Krol

The Resurgence just posted some piercing quotes from Christians of ages past to help those of us who struggle with being bored with the Bible.

My favorite one is from Spurgeon: “There is dust enough on some of your Bibles to write ‘damnation’ with your fingers.”

Check it out!

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Why keep the Sabbath?

December 2, 2012 By Tom Hallman

Most Christians have heard of the Ten Commandments. Many can even tell you what they are. But how many can answer this question: Why does God ask His people to keep the Sabbath?

Photo adapted from OZinOH on Flickr

Let’s take a look at these two familiar passages and take note of the similarities and differences:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Exodus 20:8-11 ESV)

Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant, or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. (Deuteronomy 5:12-15 ESV)

If you just skimmed those passages, you’ll probably miss the point of this blog entry 😉 Go back and read them again.

Here are some things that are the same:

Six days are allocated for work, but the Sabbath is to be kept holy.
The Sabbath is not just for us, but “to the LORD your God”.
On the Sabbath, no one works: not you, your family, your servants, your animals or your visitors.

But did you notice the key difference between the two passages?

In the Exodus passage, the motivation for keeping the Sabbath comes from the character of God in Genesis. God made everything in six days and then rested. Thus we should do the same.
In the Deuteronomy passage, the motivation for keeping the Sabbath comes from the rescue of God in Exodus. God (not Egypt) is now their master and has a different set of [very gracious] rules to live by.

So why am I noting this on a blog about Bible Study? It’s because we’re often tempted to assume we know what a passage means just because we’ve read it somewhere else before.

The Bible was inspired by God for all time for His supreme purpose: to reveal the glory of His Son, Jesus Christ. Simultaneously, the Bible was penned by different men at different times for different purposes. With these two truths in glorious tension, we study the Bible to understand as much as we can about every word, every passage, every book – even if we’ve seen a similar story previously.

In each case, be sure to observe the context of the “duplicated” passages. It may be that the main point and application may change in each case! For example:

Why might God speak of the blessing of the Sabbath to a newly-freed nation at the foot of a terrifying mountain while recalling it later with an emphasis on commands and obedience?
Why do the details of the same battle vary between Judges 4 and Judges 5?
Why is Jesus recorded as saying different things in each of the four gospels just before He dies?

Feel free to leave your thoughts on those questions in the comments!

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The Difference between a Main Point and a Summary

November 30, 2012 By Peter Krol

A main point is not the same thing as a summary.

In Bible study, it’s important to find the author’s main point. If you miss the main point, you’ve missed the main point. You’ll get caught up in secondary issues, questionable interpretations, or divisive doctrines.

One of the most difficult struggles for people in learning to study the Bible is to figure out the author’s main point. It requires them to learn how to think. They must learn how to ask good questions, and how to get the answers they need.

In addition, it requires them to learn how to figure out why the passage is there.

The most common counterfeit of the main point is the summary. It’s not all that difficult to read a passage and summarize it. We do it all the time. We summarize news articles, blog posts, novels, and movies.

Note, however, that a summary is not a main point.

A summary may be the climax of observation, but it is not the same as interpretation.

A summary captures what was said, but not why it was said.

A summary restates a passage; a main point explains the passage.

Let me give an example.

In Hebrews 7:1-28, the author writes a profound theology of Jesus’ high priesthood. There’s your summary: “Jesus is a high priest like Melchizedek.” He contrasts Melchizedek with Aaron. He engages with a few obscure Old Testament texts. He provides fodder for our debates on Bible interpretation, the relationship between old and new covenants, and the relevance of the law.

However, he is crystal clear about his main point. Look at Heb 8:1, ESV:

“Now the point in what we are saying is this: we have such a high priest…”

The theology serves a purpose. It ought to inspire hope and confidence. Those who fear God’s displeasure ought to rest assured in Christ. Those who presume on God’s graces ought to tremble at their indifference.

The author desires to move his audience to action. He doesn’t seek to inform their thinking (and then stop there). He wants to inspire them to set their hope on the only one who can give what he promises.

What does he say? Jesus is a great high priest, greater even than the Levitical priests.

Why does he say it? So you might trust him more confidently and draw near to God through him.

Do you see the difference? Do you see why it’s important to understand the main point (and not just the summary)? Unless we really hit the main point in Bible study, application remains far off and obscure or disconnected from the text.

The good news is that, once you have a summary of the passage, it’s not complicated to get to the main point. Just take your summary and ask “Why?”

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R.C. Sproul’s Proverbial Peccadillo

November 29, 2012 By Peter Krol

Thanks to Jake Swink for pointing out a helpful post by R.C. Sproul on the Proverbs.

Sproul uses Prov 26:4-5 to show how the application of a proverb often depends on the situation. Part of wisdom is figuring out which instructions apply to different life situations! Read Sproul’s excellent thoughts, and learn wisdom from a sage.

However, I disagree with the framing of Sproul’s chief conclusion that proverbs “reflect insights that are generally [not universally] true.” In his book Knowing Scripture, Sproul elaborates the point: “A common mistake in biblical interpretation and application is to give a proverbial saying the weight or force of a moral absolute” (p. 89).

This approach to Proverbs is common among evangelicals. Even the ESV Study Bible, which I really appreciate, goes in that direction. Consider the note on Proverbs 3:9-10:

“Your barns will be filled with plenty is a generalization concerning the effect of honoring the Lord with all that one has and is. It is not, however, more than a generalization (as Job’s comforters held), for to view this as a mechanical formula dishonors God and his inscrutable sovereign purposes.”

Sproul believes proverbs are not commands, and the ESV Study Bible claims they are not promises.

My problem here is that this approach to Proverbs fosters mistrust of the text by claiming that it doesn’t really say what it says. So, “Honor the Lord with your wealth…then your barns will be filled with plenty” (Prov 3:9-10) applies only when you’re not in a recession. Since proverbs are not promises, they must be only probabilities.

But I ask: Is Prov 2:1-5 not really a command with a promise? If I seek wisdom, is it possible, but not guaranteed, that I can know God? Can someone seek and seek and never find him?

Is Prov 3:11-12 only generally true? If I suffer God’s discipline, is it only generally true that he loves me as a father loves his son? Might he actually be disappointed with me, even if I’m trusting in Christ?

Is Prov 4:5 not a moral absolute? Is it not really the case that God commands people to get wisdom and hold on to his commandments? Perhaps not, since it might be only a generalization to think that God will give life to those who find wisdom (Prov 8:35).

No, there’s got to be a better way to read Proverbs.

As commentator Bruce Waltke states,

“The popular evangelical solution that these are not promises but probabilities, though containing an element of truth, raises theological, practical, and psychological problems by stating the matter badly…A psychologically well person could scarcely trust God with all his heart (Prov 3:5) knowing that he usually, but not always, keeps his obligations” (The Book of Proverbs, Chapters 1-15 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004), pp. 107-8).

So how would I frame the conclusion differently? I would say that, yes, biblical proverbs (at least those with imperatives) are commandments. Yes, proverbs (at least those that promise something) contain divine promises. But they are commandments/promises with a context. Each one applies (always) in its situation, but we ought not misapply it beyond the proper situation (as Sproul ably demonstrates in Prov 26:4-5).

See, I don’t really disagree with Sproul all that much. I agree with what he gets at in Prov 26; I just disagree with how he got there. To say that proverbs “reflect insights that are [only] generally true” is to over-generalize what proverbs intend. Such over-generalization can be misleading.

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How to Interpret: Determine the Main Point

November 23, 2012 By Peter Krol

This week I’ll explain the third of 3 steps for interpreting the Bible.

Step three was Determine the Author’s Main Point:

As you answer all your questions, pull them together into a big picture. Your job is to understand the main thing the author is communicating through the passage (2 Pet 3:15-18).

Most theological disagreements among Christians take place when people focus on things other than the main points of passages. I’m not saying that theology is bad (in fact, it’s very important). I’m simply saying that it’s important to focus on the main points of the Bible and not on secondary, questionable, or implied points (Matt 23:23-24).

Here are a few ideas to help you get to the author’s main point:

Take note of the author’s flow of thought. How did he get from the first verse to the last verse? One way to do this is to break the chapter into paragraphs. Then determine the main point for each paragraph. String them together to see what might be the main point of the whole chapter. If you’re still not sure, you could break it down further into sentences before putting it back together.
Outline the essential grammar. This requires careful observation of the passage. You can distill narratives to their basic plot structure. You can outline instructional texts by writing out just the subjects and verbs of each sentence. Often, noticing the shape of this skeleton helps with identifying the main point.
Consider what the passage says about Jesus. We know he’s the main point of the Bible (John 5:39), so we should expect each section to say something about him. I believe Luke 24:46-47 provides a helpful template. Every passage of Scripture reveals Jesus by explaining at least one of the following truths:
1. The Messiah would suffer (die).
2. The Messiah would rise from the dead.
3. We must repent of our sin and be forgiven.
4. This message (that the Messiah’s death and resurrection make forgiveness possible) must be preached to all nations.
Always ask “Why?” We’re after more than a summary of what the author wrote. We want to do our best to figure out why he wrote it.

Your analysis of the main point of Luke 2:1-21 might look something like this:

verses 1-7: in contrast to the might of Rome, Jesus, the heir of King David, is born into great obscurity.
verses 8-14: heavenly soldiers herald his birth to the lowly, not the powerful. Jesus is not presented as a conquering king, but as a savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.
verses 15-21: the lowly serve the true King by racing, viewing, and testifying.

So far, so good. We could summarize the passage by calling it “The Birth of Jesus Christ.” But we must move beyond summarizing to ask why it is here. What does Luke want to teach us?

I’d suggest something like: God sent Jesus to be born so he might save the lowly and rule them graciously. This brings him highest glory.

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Is understanding a movie different than understanding the Bible?

November 17, 2012 By Tom Hallman

Recently a Christian friend said to me, “I’m not able to understand the Bible when I read it.”

I asked, “Are you able to understand movies you watch?”

My friend replied, “Yes, but that’s different!”

Is my friend right? Do we use a different set of skills to understand movies vs the Bible?

There certainly are some differences! You can more easily convey some things in writing than you can in visual media (and vice versa). Also, the Bible generally doesn’t come with a soundtrack nor does a movie come with cross-references.

However, a majority of the skills you use to watch and understand a movie are actually quite similar to how you’d read (and understand, and apply) the Bible. That’s what we’d expect, after all, from a God who desires that His Word be truly knowable.

Consider the following:

#1: The Bible often uses repeated words and themes in order to point out when something is important and should be remembered. Movies do the same thing. How many times has the last line of a movie simply been a repeated phrase from earlier? How many romantic comedies climax with the girl repeating the exact phrase the guy had said back on the first date? Even this memorable movie quote comes as a direct result of repeated words!

#2: The Bible is full of stories about people. As you read, it is expected that you’ll love them (e.g. Jesus, Joseph, Daniel), hate them (e.g. Eli and his sons, the Pharisees, just about all Israelite kings), learn from them (e.g. Paul, Peter, Jethro), empathize with them (e.g. the woman caught in adultery in John 8, the Psalmists) or avoid them (e.g. the “fool”, the sexually immoral, the Judaizers). Movies make heavy use of this same technique. You get drawn in, identify yourself with some character, and are are often meant to change your life as a result. Consider your favorite movie characters. Don’t you in some ways try to be more like them?

#3: The Bible is full of stories about how the world works and what is true. The Bible talks about the worth of life, of family, of work, of rest, and countless other topics. Movies address the same things. For example: What is reality? What is perseverance? What is worth fighting for? What is it to be falsely accused? What is it to sacrifice? The answers to those questions are meant to teach us more about how to live.

#4: After you watch a movie with a friend, you can discuss what the movie was about. While not everything is easily explained the first time through and may require thinking for a while, you know for a fact that the writer, actors, director and producer fully intended to communicate something. They had a main point that they wanted you to understand and wrestle with. So it is with the Bible. The author (and Author) intended it to be understood and applied.

Much more can be said here, but my conclusion is that the friend I spoke of above can indeed understand the Bible. Moreover, as one who watches many movies, I suspect my friend actually knows a lot more about Bible study than either of us even realizes!

The next time you watch a movie, ask yourself how you know what you know about it. Then determine how you knew that, and try the same technique on the Bible.

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How to Interpret: Answer Questions

November 16, 2012 By Peter Krol

This week I’ll unpack the second of 3 steps for interpreting the Bible.

Step two was Answer the Questions from the Text:

Once you’ve asked your questions, answer them. There’s one critical rule, though: answer questions only if they are answered (or clearly implied) in the text (Prov 30:5-6).

Don’t go on rabbit trails. Don’t use minor details to make the text say what you want it to say. Don’t build a whole theology from one verse. Instead, answer only those questions that are either assumed or addressed in the text. Let the rest go.

Two kinds of answers are “in the text”:

Some answers are assumed in the text. The original audience would have known these answers, but they’re lost on us because of the thousands of years that separate our lifetime from theirs. We need websites or Bible dictionaries to help us understand what scholars have learned about ancient cultures. We can also reference related Scripture passages to illuminate the one at hand.
Some answers are addressed in the text. The author made these explicit for his audience.

From Luke 2:1-21, here are some examples of answers assumed in the text:

What was it like to experience upheaval for a census?
- Some in Luke’s original audience may have remembered this very census that occurred during Quirinius’s governorship. We should look it up. (On the link, scroll down to point (2) “Census of Quirinius.”)
What does it mean that Jesus is called “Christ”?
- We need help from passages like Psalm 2:2 to provide the necessary background.
How long was Joseph and Mary’s trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem? How did people view shepherds at this time?
- Most of the original audience would understand what it was like to travel from Galilee to Judea, or to interact with shepherds. We need tools like websites or Bible dictionaries to help us understand such things.

Here’s an example of answers addressed in the text:

Why does Luke contrast Jesus’ glory with that of the Roman rulers?
- Because God deserves the highest glory (Luke 2:14). He is saving the world through Christ the Lord (Luke 2:11).
So what does Luke want us to do about Jesus?
- In contrast to the Might of Rome (Luke 2:1-2), Mary treasured up these things (Luke 2:19), and the shepherds gave God highest praise & glory (Luke 2:20). Luke implies that we should have similar responses to Jesus.

Finally, here are some possible questions not assumed or addressed in the text. We ought to let them go (at least for now):

Did Mary walk or ride on a donkey?
Was Jesus born in a stable or a cave?
Do angels have wings?
Who are those “with whom he is pleased” (Luke 2:14), and what does this tell us about predestination?

What other answers to your questions can you find in the passage?

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How to Interpret: Ask Questions

November 9, 2012 By Peter Krol

Last week I introduced 3 steps for interpreting the Bible.

Step one was Ask Questions of Your Observations:

Take your observations and ask questions of them. Lots of questions. Tackle those observations from every direction.

Be as inquisitive as possible. Get better at asking questions, and you’ll get better at interpreting the Bible.

Note that your questions should be about your observations of the text. Don’t ask just any old questions. Don’t feel the need to be particularly clever. Your job is not to innovate, but to uncover. (Note how the disciples didn’t observe well, and so asked the wrong questions in John 21:22-23.)

The main questions to ask are What? Why? and So What?

What? questions define the terms. (“What did he mean?”)
Why? questions uncover the author’s purpose. (“Why did he say that?”)
So What? questions draw out the implications. (“So what does he want me to do about it?”)

For example, let’s say you’re studying Luke 2:1-21. You just observed that there’s a repeated idea of power and authority. You saw lots of words like, “Lord,” “governor,” “decree,” “Caesar,” and “glory.” Now it’s time to ask questions:

What kind of authority is Luke concerned with? What was a “governor” in Ancient Rome? What was the extent of Caesar’s power? What will Jesus do that’s different? What are angels?
- How questions often fit into this category as well: How long was the trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem? How did people view shepherds at this time?
Why is Luke so concerned with power? Why did Caesar make this decree? Why does the author contrast baby Jesus’ glory with the Roman leaders’ authority? Why were the shepherds filled with fear at the sight of an angel?
So what does this mean about where true authority lies? So what should we believe about Jesus? So what should we expect when Jesus comes into conflict with the world?

What other questions can you think of from your observation of Luke 2:1-21? See if you can identify whether your question is a What? Why? or So What? question.

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Eugene Peterson & Desiring God

November 7, 2012 By Peter Krol

Here’s a short video with Eugene Peterson, where he discusses the difference between “studying” the Bible to master it and “reading” it so it can master you.

Although we wouldn’t use the same terminology (as though “studying” the Bible is unhelpful), we agree with the sentiment. Check it out!