Understanding the Bible

There are many ways to understand the Bible, and in a small way I am somewhat qualified to have an opinion. I grew up in the Church, have been a pastor/preacher for 31 years, have a BA in Bible with a double minor in theology and history, and have a Master of Divinity Degree. In the last few weeks God has been working on me about Biblical understanding and interpretation and how I sometimes have been reading and interpreting the Bible. There are three typical ways to understand and interpret the Bible. The first is Historical context; understanding the Bible in the context of the author, the time in history, and the people that book of the Bible was originally written to. The second is in textual context; understanding the verse in its place in the text, the verses before and after, the chapters before and after, and in the light of surrounding chapters. The third way is directly; what one verse or section of scripture says directly to me, often without regard to historical or textual context.

Now I would have one or two Bible College professors flinch at the direct interpretation of the Bible and all my Seminary professors would probably want to take back my MDIV.

Here is the revelation. Both Jesus and the Apostle Paul seemed to interpret the Bible with the direct interpretation, without regard to either history or context. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John interpreted it the same way. So did John Wesley, Martin Luther, and more often than not Billy Graham. They did not approach the Bible as course work; they approached it as the inspired Word of God that speaks directly to the reader with the breath of the Holy Spirit making application from what is a living word, not a word stuck in the mud and glue of history and context. When Jesus faced the Devil at the temptation He used the scripture very directly; when Matthew used the Old Testament to prove Jesus was the Christ, he used it directly. When Paul preached the Gospel using the Scripture, He used verses directly and often out of context. Now this does not mean that God does not speak and it is not of value to understand the bible in History and context, this is a great way to study and rightly divide the Scripture. But those who want to experience a living God in a living word must read it in the light of a more direct voice of God. It is too easy to allow ourselves to be insulated from a word that God intends to pierce the heart and soul.

The so called, Biblically educated elite have often used the “out of Context” argument to debunk the great preachers and even the great movements of Christian history, both the preacher and the movement where God is working, saving souls and lives and changing the world. The Bible is not just a historical book speaking of events and ideas that unfold in history, it is a Book that is the living, breathing word of God than is God’s way of directly interceding in whatever circumstance, culture, or time in any of our lives, Churches, and world; a word that is both inspired by the Holy Spirit but equally interpreted in a living way by that same Holy Spirit. Often it’s the ears of faith that best understand the Bible over the ears of the Biblically educated. The open heart understands far more of the bible than the closed mind.