“Search The Scriptures” : The Importance Of Bible Study

"Salvation depends upon the assimilation of the mind to the Divine ideas, principles, and affections, exhibited in the Scriptures. This process commences with a belief of the gospel but is by no means completed thereby; it takes a life-time for its scope, and untiring diligence for its accomplishment The mind is naturally alien from God and all His ideas (Rom. 8:7; 1 Cor. 2:14), and cannot be brought at once to the Divine likeness. This is a work of slow development and can only be achieved by the industrious application of the individual to the means which God has given for the purpose, viz, the expression of His mind in the Scriptures of Truth.
Spiritual mindedness, or a state of mind in accordance with the mind of the Spirit as displayed in these writings, can only grow within a man by daily intercourse with that mind, there unfolded Away from this, the mind will revert to its original emptiness. The infallible advice then to every man and woman anxious about their salvation is—READ THE SCRIPTURES DAILY. It is only in proportion as this is done, that success may be looked for. The man who sows sparingly in this respect will only reap sparingly. Much spiritual fructification is only to be realized in connection with fructifying influences of the Spirit in the Word . . .
By a strict adherence to this plan from year to year, the reader will reap much profit and find himself for herself gradually losing the insipidity of the natural mind, and taking on the warm and exalted tone of the Spirit's teaching, which qualifies for the inheritance of the Saints in light".

“The words of eternal life”

The Jews who came to Jesus in John 5 were hostile to his message because they believed it to be incompatible with the Old Testament Scriptures in which they trusted, and in which they thought they had eternal life (v. 39). For Christa­delphians, with the whole of Scripture as their guide, there is no such conflict: the writings of Moses, as Jesus pointed out to his unbelieving fellow-countrymen, quite clearly bear witness of him. But the Jews refused to believe the true import of what Moses had written, and they would not accept the words of Jesus as the Word of God, even if he were to return from the dead ( v. 47; cf. Lk. 16:31).

Of course, the Jews then as now searched the Scriptures after their own particular fashion, and the Revised Version rendering of John 5:39 translates the words of Jesus in such a way as to recognize this fact: “Ye search the scriptures. . . “. Eternal life was there for the finding, and it is important to note that Jesus does not contradict the Jews’ deeply-held conviction of that vital truth. But their searching of Scripture had become, like so much of their spiritual life, a perfunctory ritual, a ceremonial tradition; and it was carried out with a veil, self-imposed, upon their understanding. As the Apostle Paul declared:

“until this day remaineth the same vail untaken away in the reading of the old testament” (2 Cor. 3:14).

Their reading of Scripture did not lead them to Christ because they did not want to know the truth, and because they would not accept that the words of Jesus, like the words of Moses, were an essential part of the revelation of God’s Word to men.

Happily, the message of Jesus in John 5 was not lost on Peter, who no doubt witnessed and heard the Master’s contention with the Jews. There were clearly many things that Jesus said which Peter, along with many of the Lord’s other followers, did not fully understand. John 6 contains many “hard sayings”, and Peter must have struggled at that time to grasp the hidden meaning of much that Jesus said and which John was later to record. But when many of the Lord’s disciples were put off by such unpalatable, or, in some cases, impenetrable words, Peter at least, as spokesman of the Twelve, had the sense to realise that there was no other source of saving knowledge apart from the words that came from God:

“Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God” (Jno. 6:68, 69).

Peter’s moving confession of faith in Jesus was thus bound up inextricably with an acceptance of his message as the Word of God however imperfectly it might then be understood.

The Word of God, therefore, whether through Moses or through Christ, performs the function of a Divine touchstone: it separates its hearers into two distinct classes, and divides the true disciples from the false. Of every hearer it demands the same response: a willingness to accept it and to seek a fuller understanding of what it has to say. Those who fail to respond in this way to the Word of God stand judged and condemned by it (Deut. 30:10-20; 31:24-27; Jno. 12:47,48). Today, as always, it is possible, like those shallow followers of Christ in John 6:67, to “go away” from God by neglecting or ignoring that eternal life that is contained in the pages of His Word. For true Christadelphians, who have long been glad to be known as ‘the people of the Book’, such neglect has rightly been unthinkable.

They may not perfectly understand all that they read in God’s Word; they are bound to recognize that there are many things “hard to be understood” there things which, as Peter himself admitted, the “unlearned and unstable wrest. . . unto their own destruction” (2 Pet. 3:16); and they look with keen anticipation to the opening of their understanding in the fullest sense, when their great Teacher comes again to fulfill all “the things concerning himself” which are written in the Word. In the meantime, however, they recognize no other source of saving truth than that which has been left on record by the Holy Spirit;’ and they desire continually, like the angels and prophets themselves (1 Pet. 1:10,12), to “look into”2 God’s revelation, and to “search diligently” in it. And this they have done as a community for well over a century because they know, like Peter, that their eternal salvation depends upon it.

What is Bible study?

There are, however, even sometimes among Christadelphians, many misconceptions as to what Bible study really is. Perhaps the word ‘study’ itself does not help to define this all-important activity in relation to the Bible since, today, ‘study’ is so often associated with the educational system, with exams, and with academic work of every kind. Both the verb and the noun ‘study’ conjure up a picture of the lonely scholar burning the midnight oil, ruining his eyesight, cramming his head full of facts, often to the exclusion of much healthier pursuits. But is this the only sort of study that qualifies as Bible study?

It certainly seems to be the sort of study that Solomon had in mind when he wrote in Ecclesi­astes 12:12: “of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh”. But Solomon was undoubtedly not speaking of the study of the Bible here; and though this verse has sometimes been used to denigrate excessive diligent mental application, it should be remembered that the Preacher in Ecclesiastes surveys many other common human activities also, and finds them all equally “vanity and vexation of spirit”—which, from a purely humanistic point of view, they certainly are. In any event, therefore, Solomon’s words are neither a definition nor a prohibition of the diligent analysis of Scripture.

The Word of God itself, however, does give us elsewhere some clearer indications of the true nature of spiritually profitable study. Solomon is again not speaking primarily of Bible study when he declares in Proverbs 15:28 that “The heart of the righteous studieth to answer” ; but the Hebrew word he uses (hagah, ‘to meditate’, ‘to ponder’) clearly depicts the process of careful mental consideration that enables a righteous man to speak right words. And when we take into account the fact that this same Hebrew word was earlier used in connection with Joshua’s Divine­ly-commanded Bible study,4 as well as with the Divinely-commended Bible study of the Lord Jesus Christ, in one of David’s prophetic pen-pictures of him,5 we begin perhaps to see more clearly that any deliberate weighing of the words of God, however sustained or however deep, must qualify as profitable Bible study in the Bible sense.

The use of the word ‘study’ in the AV of the New Testament is also perhaps not particularly helpful in reinforcing this true Biblical concept of study. The modern ‘academic’ connotations of the word were, of course, not present in its 1611 usage. So when Paul advises Timothy, “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed” (2 Tim. 2:15), he is not primarily ( as some have supposed) exhorting him to read his Bible carefully, for the Greek word used (spoudazo) means ‘make haste’ or, figuratively, ‘give diligence’ (cf. RV). And yet, immediately after this exhortation to diligence and hard work generally, the apostle significantly goes on to relate such hard work specifically to Timothy’s attempts to understand the Word of God correctly: ” . . . rightly dividing the word of truth”. Thus, on the inspired authority of Paul, we can find no better spiritual arena for the expenditure of our mental effort than in applying ourselves to those Scriptures to which the apostle elsewhere openly commends not only Timothy,6 but also, in his parting words to them, the elders of Timothy’s ecclesia.7 It is not without interest, too, that in Hebrews 4:11 the use of the same Greek word spoudazo (translated “labour” in this context) is followed up immediately, as in 2 Timothy 2:15, with a well-known reference to the Word of God:

“Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest . . . For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword”.

It is clear, therefore, that whatever else we may do in the life in Christ, however else we may also spend our energy in the service of the Lord, our diligent application to the Word is an essential part of that labour. It is clear also from these and other parts of Scripture that any regular and careful contact with the Word that leads to further mental consideration of its meaning and message is Bible study in its truest and most profitable sense.

To search the Scriptures is to hear the voice of God Himself. To hear God speak is to come to know and love Him. To know and love Him is to obey Him. To obey Him is to please Him. To please Him is the aim and object of every true disciple of His Son. All this, as well as spiritual growth, moral guidance, personal comfort, and true wisdom, is the work of God’s Word in drawing to Himself the hearts and minds of men. As the Lord Jesus himself told those unbelieving Jews from their misunderstood Scriptures: “It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God” (Jno. 6:45).8 With such a Teacher, who would choose not to be a Bible student?

References

  1. the first part of the ‘Foundation Clause’ of the Birmingham Amended Statement of Faith: “That the book currently known as the Bible, consisting of the Scriptures of Moses, the prophets, and the apostles, is the only source of knowledge concerning God and His purposes at present extant or available in the earth. . . “.
  2. The Greek word used in 1 Peter 1:12 to describe angelic Bible study is parakupto, and means, literally, ‘to stoop down alongside’—an expression clearly conveying the sense of a careful concern for detail.
  3. The Bible study of the prophets is depicted in 1 Peter 1:10 by the Greek word exereunao (literally, ‘to trace out’)— a much stronger form of the word used by Jesus in John 5:39 about the abortive searching of Scripture by the Jews.
  4. Joshua 1:8: “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way pros­perous, and then thou shalt have good success”.
  5. Psalm 1:1,2: “Blessed is the man. . . (whose) delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law doth he meditate day and night”.
  6. 1 Timothy 4:13: ” . give attendance to reading”. Cf. also 2 Timothy 3:14-17.
  7. Acts 20:32: “And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified”.
  8. In a previous Special Issue of The Testimony (“The Spirit is at work today”, January 1982), the present writer has discussed at length the important doctrine, alluded to in this article and in the long quotation from Brother Roberts at the head of the article, that the Bible is the Spirit’s voice, and that it has the Divine power within itself to perform the Divine work of enlightenment, conversion, and sanctification. Readers are directed to that earlier article, which is complementary to the present one: “The Word of God is alive and powerful”, The Testimony, January 1982, pp. 1-7.