On my twitter feed this morning, I saw a link to a blog that caught my attention for a moment. I read several missional blogs and follow several missional leaders on twitter, and this one happened to say something that I hadn't really thought of before. In sum, the caption said something like, "missional communities study the Bible, but Bible study isn't why they gather."
That got me to thinking. What is the "point" of Bible study? Of course, we want to be growing in God's Word. God's Spirit works in us as we are engaged in the Word. It brings life as it reveals our God and His grace. It also shows us God's design for life in this world, as well as our shortcomings and sin in that same regard. Our study is also to help us see how God has acted in the past so that we have an eye to seeing how He continues His work in this world.
And yet, there's something to our study of the Word when we have specific things that we'd like to grow in or understand better. And I think that this might be the point of the blog link that I saw this morning. When God works it in our hearts to take seriously His desire that we take His message of His Son to the world, we're wise to see what the Bible says about how God wants us to do that. It involves looking to the Bible for a specific purpose or reason. We identify an area that we want to focus on, and then we see what all God has to say about that.
Come to think of it, that's often how we approach the Bible. If we want to know about God's gifts of grace, say in the sacraments, we look at the parts of the Bible that speak to those. If we want to know about the sacrifice of Jesus, we look up the parts of the Bible which speak about that. And so, it makes sense, that if we want to see what the Bible says about how we share the message of forgiveness in Jesus, we would look to the Bible to see what it has to say about that topic.
I guess, in summary, I both agree with the link that I saw, and I disagree. I think there's more to the Bible than just looking for practical wisdom when you have a question about something, but I also think that the Bible gives us much practical wisdom. However, God also does more than just convey practical wisdom. He delivers life through His Word, especially as His Word guides us to what Jesus has done for us.
That got me to thinking. What is the "point" of Bible study? Of course, we want to be growing in God's Word. God's Spirit works in us as we are engaged in the Word. It brings life as it reveals our God and His grace. It also shows us God's design for life in this world, as well as our shortcomings and sin in that same regard. Our study is also to help us see how God has acted in the past so that we have an eye to seeing how He continues His work in this world.
And yet, there's something to our study of the Word when we have specific things that we'd like to grow in or understand better. And I think that this might be the point of the blog link that I saw this morning. When God works it in our hearts to take seriously His desire that we take His message of His Son to the world, we're wise to see what the Bible says about how God wants us to do that. It involves looking to the Bible for a specific purpose or reason. We identify an area that we want to focus on, and then we see what all God has to say about that.
Come to think of it, that's often how we approach the Bible. If we want to know about God's gifts of grace, say in the sacraments, we look at the parts of the Bible that speak to those. If we want to know about the sacrifice of Jesus, we look up the parts of the Bible which speak about that. And so, it makes sense, that if we want to see what the Bible says about how we share the message of forgiveness in Jesus, we would look to the Bible to see what it has to say about that topic.
I guess, in summary, I both agree with the link that I saw, and I disagree. I think there's more to the Bible than just looking for practical wisdom when you have a question about something, but I also think that the Bible gives us much practical wisdom. However, God also does more than just convey practical wisdom. He delivers life through His Word, especially as His Word guides us to what Jesus has done for us.
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