Do
your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need
to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. (2
Today we can see the state of
the church and it is a pathetic picture as the church has gone astray from the
sound doctrine. In reality there is no difference between Roman
Catholicism and Protestantism. They all agree in major doctrines and the
gospel is a common gospel for everyone. The reformers brought back the
purity of the only true gospel back to the church, as there is only one gospel,
even if an angel comes and gives another gospel according to the book of let a
divine curse fall upon that person. The gospel cannot be
compromised. Today people just believe what ever comes from the
pulpit. Just because there are people falling all over the place or someone
has a lot of credentials as a teacher or a pastor it does not mean anything to
the Lord if the word of God is compromised. Need to cut the true line and
separate the truth and error. There is no personal Bible reading and
Bible studies, as the people who come to church depends on the pastors’ sermon
for the rest of the week.
Almost all Christians have a Bible at home. Some of your Bibles look
neatly bound and have beautiful covers, does not look worn out, looks
still new. And some of you keep the Bible in a safe place at home and
only on Sundays you open the Bible. There is no reading the precious word
of God, do not search the scriptures and study and then circumstances arise
when you go through a trial or some hardship, people get paranoid, emotionally
hurt, get angry as they cannot find the scriptures for their comfort.
People are not reading their Bibles as they come only on Sunday mornings to
hear the word of God.
First let us see why some read the Bible and still they live worldly
lives, there is no sanctification, holiness or Christ like behavior.
·
Many read the Bible as a tradition. I did my part to God by
reading and praying, and now I am free from the rest of the day to do my own
business. God is not looking for a sacrifice, he is looking for
obedience. If you have read the Bible and did not understand what it
meant, in short you just wasted your time. It becomes a
superstition. We condemn the early Roman Catholic Church as the priest
read the Bible to the people in Latin language and the people were kept in
darkness. It was more like a superstition and a sacrifice.
·
Some read the Bible as an accomplishment. I have read the whole Bible;
I have done something that people do not do. It is an experience a past event
and it is history. I have done it, in my life.
·
Some not only read the Bible but study it and get puffed up what they
have learned as breed pride for their own destruction.
·
Some study, as they have to teach others. I am studying, as I have
to teach a Bible study. It becomes a work and not a joy. They teach
others what to do and they do not do, leaves a bad example, as they do not
become sanctified before the Lord.
·
Some read the Bible to Critic God, with a critical eye to find faults.
·
Some read only their favorite parts of the Bible. Some like only the end times like the rapture, the anti Christ,
some like only the election. Their body grows only in one part,
looks abnormal. Need to grow in all aspects knowing the whole council of
God.
It is the same with the person
who read the Bible daily and not understanding. It is like a bird flying
over the land and not finding a rest and nesting. There is a thing as
praying in prayer. Praying from your most interior part, not only from the
mouth but from the soul, so in praising in song that is inward intense
devotion, so in fasting that is inward fasting, and so with reading the word,
not as a mechanical type reading which does not profit anything but interior
reading, the soul reading.
Reading with clarity,
Nehemiah 8:8.
Have you not read? Mat. 12:3-5; 19:4;
Jesus is speaking to the Scribes and the Pharisees. The Scribes and the
Pharisees studied the word of God daily, they knew how many times such a word
is written, and they were the intense readers of the word. They were
prideful of their knowledge in the word as they were the masters in the
word. Our Lord met them on their own court, their own camp as he
said to them, “Have you not read”? Your eyes have gone over the letters
and counted the letters, know the position of each letters but you have not
read because you did not understand.
It is good to read a lot of
books of great Biblical authors, but the best food is the word of
God. The truth is sweetest where it breaks from the smitten Rock.
Most people drink their water most of the time from the tank, always depending
on the sermons of the pastor and reading Biblical books, but not finding the
truth for themselves. It is always best to drink from the well.
Psalm 36:9; Psalm 119:16.
Make a serious effort to
understand what you are reading.
Illumination of the mind
How can you love God if you do not have knowledge of God? We can kiss the
Bible and will have no love devotions to the contents of the Bible. We
can reverence the letters in the Bible and will not have true devotion to the
Lord. When you read the Bible, your motive is to know God, come closer to him,
become like our Lord Jesus. The high priest in the Old Testament before
he put the incense upon the brazen altar, he always lit the candlestick
first. It shows that the mind should be lighted before we can worship the
Lord. We need to have knowledge of God before we can love him, and
worship him. Filled with knowledge of God’s will, Colossians
1:9–11.
Awakening
the mind.
The Lord spoke to Moses from the burning bush and said, “Take off your sandals,
for the place you are standing is holy ground.” (Exodus 3:5)
Moses has passed this way many times always wearing his sandals, and now when
the Lord appeared it became sacred ground. In the same way like Moses we
come from our work or from the store or another activity from the world.
We cannot immediately study the Bible to see the heavenly mysteries. We
need to understand in the Bible is the Lord and we need like Moses took off his
sandals we need to take our worldly thoughts away as we are entering into the
heavenly thoughts. Just like the priest in the Old Testament washed his
feet before did his holy work in the temple we need to wash our mind, our eyes
with prayer before we enter into his holy word. We are
reading his holy word and we need to do it in holy fashion, as we are not
reading another newspaper, magazine or reading the fine poetry. This is
our spiritual meal. We need to pray before we partake
our spiritual meal so we can fully enjoy the contents and give glory to God.
Meditation.
There are shallow passages in
the Bible, which is easy to understand, it is like the sheep eating grass in a
plain flat area. But some times there are deep valleys we have to go
through and these scriptures are difficult to understand. God put it
purposely so we will labor, pray, meditate for us to understand. When we
come to these difficult scripture we have to think. Our heavenly Father
educates us for heaven. There is no easy short cut to understand these
difficult scriptures, need to labor, meditate, there is pain involved and some
of the difficult scriptures are understood with much labor and
pain. Like grapes cannot yield wine until we press with our feet to
get the juice out. The olives must be put under a wheel and pressed again
and again to get the oil out. Sometimes when you open the shell of a
peanut or a cashew nut, we see the nut has been eaten by a worm. This
worm has made a hole with all his strength to get into the nut. Then he lives
inside the shell eating slowly the nut. In the same way we need to labor
to understand the deep truths of the Word. And the word of God is
always most precious when we live upon it. We need to labor to understand
these truths; means we need to get to our knees and cry out before God for
direction, we must ask the author of the book for understanding. Call
upon the author himself; call upon the Holy Spirit to unlock the secret
mysteries, once you understand, oh how sweet it can be to our souls. Psalm
119:25-28 1 Corinthians 2:10–11.
Do not neglect reading the historical accounts of the Bible.
Read Matthew 12:1-4, see verses 3-4. This was a
historical event. If they read it carefully they would understand. But
many of us when it comes to history of the Bible we give less priority.
Beloved there are greater depths of spirituality in the historical parts of the
Bible and it become more precious to your soul. The historical teachings
come home to your soul. For example the Lord went to history for us to
understand the meaning of the brazen serpent.
What about reading Exodus,
Leviticus Numbers. These books have become very boring to some of
us. All you find is the wilderness the tabernacle, the furniture, bowls,
boards, sockets, doors, knobs, scarlet, linen, precious stones, candlesticks,
etc., Why did God put them in the Bible? Look for the inner meaning,
do a thorough search. The best treasure is found in the most closely
locked up place. Do a thorough search and unlock the meaning of these
words and you will be blessed. (Proverbs 2:1-6)
Jesus is
the Word.
Read John 5:39. From Genesis to Revelation the center is Jesus Christ,
the Lord of the Sabbath. He is the proof the Bible. From every
little village in
Read 1 John 1:1-3
here we see how John’s purpose is that we may have true fellowship with the
Father and Jesus Christ. For us to have true fellowship with the Father
we need to know the Son. We need see him in every page of the
Bible. We need to know him personally, by looking upon him with our eyes,
seeing him in the scripture, and then he will be revealed to us, he becomes
part of our life. Reading the Bible will make you become like him, we
will love him and adore him, as John said, we have seen with our eyes and our
hands have handled concerning the Word of life. The Lord be with you.
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