Why and how should I read the Bible?
Before I married my wife - she spent a year away, teaching in Tanzania. E-mail, phone or MSN were not an option - only letter writing, and when I recieved a letter from her I read it time and time again. Because there is something powerful about the written word! Whatever our current circumstances, whatever we are doing or feeling it always says the same thing.
Christians believe that God has written a love letter to us which always says the same thing no matter the circumstances - the Bible.
What is the Bible and how did we get it?
Firstly , it is not a single book, but a library of 66 books written at different times. The earliest (Genesis and Job) are at least 4,000 years old and the most recent (Revelation and some NT books) around 1,900.
Secondly , each of these books, once written, was then copied and distributed. Did this process change the message?
The originals were copied and then distributed to places like Rome, Alexandria, Ephesus and North Africa etc etc. These copies were then copied, then copied again and repeated again. Eventually, the originals decayed.
So the question is, how close to the originals are the copies that we have?
Imagine you work for the British police in the days before computing or printing. All messages are hand written or individually typed. If you worked at a tiny police department in the highlands of Scotland and you received a command from central office it would have gone through many different departments before getting to you and have been copied many times. How could you tell whether you have heard or received the message correctly?
You could either compare your letter with those of other police departments in different parts of the country or find a copy of the original, or as near to the source command as possible and compare it.
Similarly, when we come to the Bible, there are 2 ways to tell whether we have recieved reliable texts as originally written:
1. By comparing manuscripts. A comparison with as close to the originals as you can find, or with manuscripts from different copying centers show that we have ne real problems with the authenticity and reliablility of the Bible, and where there are discrepancies, modern translations of the Bible often note these small variations in the margin.
Some early mauscripts that help us see the reliability of the New Testament are the John Rylands fragment – from around 125 AD (Johns Gospel), the Magdalen fragments around which there is some debate as to its dating, either 70AD or 200AD (Matthews Gospel) and the Chester Beatty Papyri – from around 250BC (contains most of the NT).
2. Bycomparing the manuscripts of OT scriptures with the Dead Sea Scrolls – which were ‘frozen in time' 2000 years ago.
In both cases the manuscript variations are small and unimportant.
Thirdly , who decided which books made the final cut?
The Bible slowly built up over time, as God’s people collected the documents that spoke to them with greatest power and relevance. No one ever decided what should be in the Bible, the people of God just found themselves treasuring the books that helped them most. it worked a little like deciding the best music of the 80’s or UKTV gold - those that endure are those that people appreciated and which made and impact or a difference. The rest are dropped or forgotten. The Bible books are those documents that were of most relevance, significance and which spoke most powerfully to the NT Christians
Fourthly , what about the ‘missing’ books of the bible?
The ‘Directors cut’ is the version of the film that the studio wouldn’t sanction… did the church do the same? There have been many different claims of extra books to be included over the years – Barnabas, Mary etc. But it might help if I showed you a bit of one of the hottest contenders… the Gospel of Thomas:
“Simon Peter said to them: "Let Mary go away from us, for women are not worthy of life." Jesus said: "Lo, I shall lead her, so that I may make her a male, that she too may become a living spirit, resembling you males. For every woman who makes herself a male will enter the kingdom of heaven.”
It has been rejected for a reason, that a simple reading makes clear!
So why bother to read the bible?
Christians think that direct personal contact with the Bible is life-changing. A quick flick through some verses in Psalm 119 (v103-112) show that the writer consider the Bible to be -
- Sweeter than honey.
- Gives understanding, direction.
- Treasure, my heart’s delight.
It brings joy to him, and delights his heart. We may say" all books promote themselves don’t they. The writer would say that" - but he is not the only one who thinks that. Today, many people treat the Bible in the same way. But why?
The Bible is popular
A quick visit to Google Answers shows tells us - who are the 10 most read authors measured by books sold regardless of genre (fiction, nonfiction etc) worldwide? Number One is the Bible
“No one really knows how many copies of the Bible have been printed, sold, or distributed. The Bible Society's attempt to calculate the number printed between 1816 and 1975 produced the figure of 2,458,000,000. A more recent survey, for the years up to 1992, put it closer to 6,000,000,000 in more than 2,000 languages and dialects. Whatever the precise figure, the Bible is by far the bestselling book of all time."
But the Bible is also powerful
Mahatma Gandhi once said - "You Christians look after a document containing enough dynamite to blow all civilisation to pieces, turn the world upside down and bring peace to a battle-torn planet. But you treat it as though it is nothing more than a piece of good literature."
There are many people who treat it as much more than a piece of 'good literature' because they believe it is powerful. A quick look at history displays it's powerful influence. Lord Shaftesbury – who was key to child labour becoming illegal in this country, William Wilberforce – who was instrumental in the stamping out of slavery and George Muller – who set up orphanages all were affected by the poweful influence of the Bible on their lives which drove them to initaite huge social and cultural change for good. Even today,the 'Make Poverty History campaign' and 'Stop the Traffik' campaigns have Christians right at their centre.
And the Bible is also precious. That is why people want it! There are 6,809 languages in the world. Some or all of the Bible is available in 2,303 and work has started in 1,410 others. Only about three thousand minority languages do not have a Bible.
So how does it work?
What is the Bible, and how do we hear God speaking through it?
1. God has spoken – Revelation
From 2 Timothy 3:15-17 we learn how God has revealed himself to us. The key word here is inspired. Not in the sense that Shakespeare is inspired… very powerful and moving… but literally expired by God. It was written by men, but breathed out by God. Like any pen - it doesn’t write by itself, it is the powerful hand of the author who controls it, but the pen adds character to what is written – the colour, type of ink etc. The author defines the content, meaning etc.
The Bible is a love letter, straight from God. But it is not just a letter, is it?
Paul tells us that “All scripture” is expired by God. The Bible is 51% stories, 29% poetry and 20% explanation which means that there is all sorts of different literature for all sorts of different people in all sorts of different situations. The people through whom God wrote were not robots, they were real people. Some bits were written by a court chronicler; others a stressed out prophet or a mother, an old man inclined to ramble. It is not uniform – it is diverse in style and content.
What we have is not one book, but sixty-six, not a list of rules but a rich collection of literature…
But it has one purpose - and this is what it is designed to do:
2 Timothy 3:16-17 tells us it is useful for - Teaching, Rebuking, Training, Correcting. Any electrical appliance comes with a manual or handbook, with guidelines on how to use it to prolong the life of the applaince, or the owner and for it to be used properly to it's full potential. The Bible is the same in purpose.
But not only has God spoken in the past -
2. God continues to speak – into a Relationship
The Bible is a fascinating study, but the purpose of this book is to bring us face-to-face with Jesus (see John 5:39-40) . It is a love letter from him written to people who are not-yet-Christians and to people who already are. It helps us to beome more like Jesus, know Joy and peace in the midst of struggles, give guidance, health, healing and cleansing as well as giving us power and defence agianst spiritual attack.
A lot of people say, “But I don’t want a rule book!” Imagine a game of football without any rules - where would the enjoyment, satisfaction and safety be in that...?
So,how do I read the Bible?
3. How do I do this?
“Spirituality” is a buzz-word of the nineties. It is about taking time to feed and nurture your spirit. This business of reading the bible for yourself is part of Christian Spirituality. It works; reading and thinking about the Bible is a core activity in developing your spirit.
So how to do it? You need
- Time – plan ahead [like training in the gym or doing language lessons] Where possible regularly
- Place – clear a space in your life (even a place)
- Method – open-ness, read slowly and thoughtfully, don’t get stuck on the tough bits, keep going. Pray.
- Respond – put it into practice.
- Keep a journal if you can.
I would add one piece of advice; pick simple material to start with – Revelation or Daniel is not a good idea! Start with a gospel, then one of Paul’s short letters, try Genesis.
Why bother? – finally, back in Psalm 119 we find that when we do this we discover a life where we are
- lead and guided.
- Your heart is satisfied
- You are given hope
This talk is based around the outline found in the Alpha Manual. For more information look visit Alpha.org