As we continue into our third week of learning to study our Bible, it occurred to me that some dear readers may be asking themselves the same question that I would have asked as a young believer, which is “Wouldn’t it be easier to just make a list of how to study the Bible in one column and then move on to something else?”
The answer is yes, it would be easier, but there are pitfalls doing it that way. A believer runs the risk of making the most beautiful thing in the universe, their personal relationship with God, into a formula of do’s and do not’s. There were folks back in Old Testament times who did that and ended up going down the list, or following the letter of the law only, and their hearts were far away from God. God wants your hearts, dear readers and He loves you beyond what can be imagined!
This is a different kind of study of how to study the Bible and the goal is to not only have you live the peaceful and powerful life Jesus died for you to have, but to show how intimately rewarding it can be to share your life with the Holy Spirit and to walk in love with Him more each day, for He is crazy about you.
This gathering of letters, bound into a book, is God’s way to reach us through our minds, but the power of the message flows from the love of God, who dwells in our hearts through the Holy Spirit and sheds his love out through us. That leads into the third way to study your Bible, which is: Considering, pondering, and meditating with the Holy Spirit on the words of God.
It may be a phrase, “Jesus loves me” (John 3), a question, “How long did it take for Jesus to make the scourge He used to drive them all out?” (John 2), or meditating on a scene of Jesus with the children (Luke 18), or wondering how did Jesus make the water into wine, etc? And the best part of all this, is that God wants to share His life with you and if you are a believer in Christ, then God is with you now through the person of the Holy Spirit (John 14).
The time you take to ponder what you have read, to talk with God about questions and sharing your understanding or lack of understanding with Him personally is time to be highly valued and is a way to remain freshly filled with the loving presence of God.
Until next time, God bless you and your loved ones.
