Reading or Understanding?

 

This morning I preached Psalm 39 and in the introduction I pointed out that there was a difference between reading and understanding the Bible. In order to read the Bible we need just two things. We need the ability to read, and we need the Bible to be printed in the language that we read.

Many people can read the Bible, but, unfortunately, many people read without understanding what it is that they are reading. They may read and get the idea of this part or that part. They may be able to learn the story of this person or that person. They may be able to see that this person and event connect later on with that person and that event. But they won’t get a greater sense of what was intended by the One who gives us the whole book. They will read the Bible as a book, but not see what it is that makes it the Good Book.

In order to read the Bible with a sense of understanding what it might mean through what it says the first thing needed is a basic sense of faith. When I say basic here I mean very basic. We need to believe that there is a God and that this God has chosen to communicate to the world through the words that He inspired the Bible’s writers to put down on paper. There is a God who speaks and He speaks through His word.

Secondly, we need humility. This God is God, and we are not. He is speaking, as He has every right to. He is not our conversation partner, nor someone we negotiate with. He speaks, and we listen. Our baseline should be that in all things He speaks as the expert and that we listen as people who are on the first day of a new job.

Third, we need wisdom. In some areas He tells us more than we need to know, while in others there is a level of understanding we piece together as we read what He has to say and figure out what to do with what we are learning. If He says clearly ‘A’ and we pretend to think He meant ‘B’ we are not acting with wisdom. We are also not acting with wisdom when we read something clearly and come to the conclusion that we can improve on His ideas. Wisdom here is not so much what we do, but what we restrain ourselves from doing. 

The fourth basic thing I mentioned this morning that we need to understand the Bible is submission. Submitting to authority is not a very popular idea in our day and age, but if we read the Bible we can see that its basic unpopularity goes all the way back to Genesis, chapter 3. But, again, it is God who is God, and we who are not god, ever. He sets the boundaries, He determines the terms, and because His knowledge and wisdom are perfect, what ever boundaries He gives to us, whatever tasks He calls us to, will always be for our good. That just goes hand-in-hand with the way God works, all of the time.

The Bible is a beautiful book with a very beautiful story. The more I read it the more fascinated I seem to be by it, as I understand parts that I didn’t quite get the first time, or the second time, or maybe the umpteenth time that I read them. I have a friend who mentioned once in conversation that he had read the Gospel of John 60 to 80 times in his life, and yet that there was always something fresh and new about it.

So to borrow from Augustine, “Take up and read,” asking God to give you understanding. I took a peak at my Bible reading plan for tomorrow and I’ll be in the Psalms again, and I’m excited!

 

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.