This is the first instalment in an ongoing series about
studying the Bible using methods deduced
from the Bible itself. The series introduction can be found here.
Looking for Answers
A group of Sadducees once tried to convince Jesus by the use
of an absurd hypothetical that resurrection of the dead is impossible. The Lord
didn’t simply give them a lecture on his personal opinion or fall into the trap
of answering their silly question. Instead, he referred them right back to the
Old Testament that they professed to believe in order to correct their
misunderstanding:
“Jesus answered them, ‘You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God.’ ” (Matt. 22:29)
“Have you not read what was said to you by God?” he asked, and
proceeded to astonish them with a conclusion drawn from the use of the tense of
the Hebrew equivalent of the verb “to be” in the book of Exodus.
One problem with the methods of the Sadducees and other
religious sects is that they approached the Scripture with their minds already
made up, trying to make the words of God fit their preconceptions. That interpretive
technique is as spectacularly flawed today as it was when they tried it.
But the problem the Lord addressed in their understanding was
that they had not looked far enough or
carefully enough in the Law for their answers.
We need to “know the Scriptures”.
Responding to Trickery
When Satan tested the Lord in the wilderness, Jesus once again
referred to the Old Testament Scriptures. In fact, this was his constant habit.
“He answered, ‘It is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” ’ ” (Matt. 4:4)
Here the Lord makes it clear that it’s not enough to just be
able to reference a particular text like “I am the God of Abraham …” to respond
to a particular question correctly. He says man lives by “every word” that comes from the mouth of God.
This implies that a serious Bible student needs more than a
concordance to direct him or her to a specific passage. He or she needs a comprehensive awareness of the entire
revelation of God in order to “live”.
We need to be familiar with “every word”.
One Author
In Peter’s second letter we read:
“… no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20,21)
Peter says that though different men wrote different books
of the Bible, God is its author and the Holy Spirit the agent of its creation. Similar
teaching is found in Paul’s words to Timothy: “All Scripture is breathed out by
God” (2 Tim. 3:16).
With numerous different men “carried along” to write the
words of God, we might anticipate a variety of approaches and styles, which in
fact is what we find.
With a single, omniscient, unchanging author, we might anticipate
consistency throughout the entire revelation of God from beginning to end, which is also what we find(1).
The Best Interpreter
As a result, when we begin to interpret any specific passage
of Scripture, or when we want to understand the meaning of any Bible word or
phrase, the best tool we have at our disposal is comparison.
Cultures come and go. Languages change. The teaching of the
church itself throughout history has often capitulated to the whims of
politics, utility or popularity. In our own day, political correctness and
modern individualism seek to interpret the word of God for us, like the
Sadducees, through the lens of their own preconceptions.
The best — the only safe — interpreter of Scripture is
Scripture itself.
Our next few posts will focus on specific types of comparison that are useful in Bible Study.
(1) I recognize that many people have pointed out ‘inconsistencies’
in Scripture. One common feature of the Bible’s detractors seems to be that few
of them have read it carefully, if at all. Books aplenty have been written on
the subject by both sides of the argument; the sceptics raising alleged
inconsistencies and believers knocking them down. These things are easy to
Google and it’s not my intention to deal with specific allegations of inconsistency here.
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