Be Rich in the Word: Reading the Word

The Bible assumes that God is, and it teaches that God created all things to reveal his glory to all creation. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:1-2). 

Further, the Bible displays and declares that God has spoken in order to reveal his character, his thoughts, his affections, his actions, and his purposes and plans for creation. “And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken” (Isaiah 40:5). 

It is glorious enough that God created in order to reveal himself, but it is glorious beyond compare that God has spoken in order to make himself known to humankind, the pinnacle of his creation. Since our Creator has spoken to us, our greatest privilege and obligation in life is to listen to what he has said. Listening begins by hearing the words of God read and preached on their own terms, and it deepens by picking up a Bible and reading those words for ourselves day by day. As we do, we reap many rewards, including the following three things. 

First, reading the Bible day by day is a practical way of putting God first and loving him most. Above all things, the Lord calls on people to love him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, for when he takes his proper place in our lives, all other people and things take their proper places as well. There is no better way to display that his command is our desire than listening to what he has to say day by day. 

Second, reading the Bible day by day is a simple way of getting to know our heavenly Father. Since the words of God reveal the character, thinking, feelings, actions, purposes, promises, and plans of God, they help us not only to learn things about him but to actually know him. In other words, reading the words of God is not simply a matter of learning facts about God, rather, it is about developing an intimate knowledge of God. 

Third, reading the Bible day by day is the best way to grow in our knowledge of the gospel that we might receive the grace of God in Christ and walk in the ways of Christ. “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:8-10). 

Friends, the rewards of reading the Bible day by day are great, and plans for doing so abound (see www.navigators.org or the YouVersion app). I urge you, then, to choose a plan and read the words of God that you might come to know God, love God, and walk in his ways. 

Living by Faith: The Faithfulness of God

So far in this series I’ve said that faith is hoping or trusting in God by clinging to his promises through his Word. To put it another way, faith is simply trusting in the faithfulness of God. So much can be said about faith, but if you will remember just this one sentence, it will be enough—faith is trusting in the faithfulness of God. You don’t need a great education or the right background or the right family or the right skills or good looks or straight teeth or money or possessions or anything other than this: simple childlike trust that God is faithful and will do all that he has said he will do. If you have this faith, you can stand in the company of the giants of faith because in the end those giants aren’t giants at all. Rather, they’re simply people who trusted in the infinitely giant faithfulness of God. 

So it is that the author says in verse 2 that faith is the reason the people of old received their commendation: not condemnation but commendation! By “people of old” the author means all of those he goes on to talk about in the rest of the chapter. He means the biblical ancestors who went before us and the early believers who trusted in Christ. And what he’s saying is that these people received commendation, or more literally a testimony, because of this one thing: they trusted in the faithfulness of God. 

As we progress through this chapter, we’ll see that the one testifying of them, the one commending them, the one lifting them up and saying, “Pay attention to this and that one,” is God himself. These men and women are not fleshly heroes, rather, God himself has lifted them up and bid us to carefully consider their way of life. And again, the reason he is willing to do that is because they had faith in him. That is to say, the main thing God wants us to know and notice about these people is not that they were amazing but that they found God to be amazing as they trusted in his faithfulness. God spoke to them and led them, they listened to what he had to say, they trusted in what he had to say, and they discovered that God does what he says he’s going to do. In other words, they discovered that God is faithful. 

So, whereas some people call Hebrews 11 “The Hall of Faith,” we really should call it “The Hall of the Faithfulness of God” because all of the people in this chapter point away from themselves and toward God saying, “The Lord is truly faithful. He is truly amazing. All that he promised came to pass in his time and way. We had to suffer, and there were many hard times. We struggled with our flesh and we failed at so many points. But along the way we discovered that God is truly faithful and we bid you to trust in him, hope in him, and cling to him with us.” 

This is why God is not afraid to draw our attention to these people and say, “Imitate their way of life.” Their way of life was to look to God, listen to God, and walk in the ways of God because they believed that God is faithful: and indeed, God is faithful. So again, faith is simply trusting in the faithfulness of God. It’s not a feeling. It’s not a force, as the word-of-faith people say it is. Rather, faith is the trust a child has in her Father. Faith is the heart of a child that says, “I can only be sure of what I hope for when I hope for what is sure, and what is sure is my Father and his will, words, and ways.” 

With this definition in mind, the author goes on now in the rest of the chapter to give us a number of examples of faith, all of whom learned what it means to trust in the faithfulness of God and even now are encouraging us to join their number. I pray that as we consider the examples of faith-filled people, that the infinitely faithful God will fill us with faith and teach us to live the same kinds of lives as those who’ve gone before us. 

Book Review: “Reading Scripture with the Church Fathers” (By Christopher A. Hall)

Christopher A. Hall. Reading Scripture with the Church Fathers (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity, 1998). 

This book is both an introduction to how leading Christians from the first seven centuries of the church read the Bible and a guided invitation to read their works. Hall’s aim is to present the method and content of eight representative patristic fathers, four from the eastern church (Athanasius, Gregory of Nazianzus, Basil the Great, and John Chrysostom) and four from the western church (Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine, and Gregory the Great). 

He begins by pressing into the modern milieu in order to expose and diminish obstacles that stand in the way of fruitfully reading these ancient texts. He specifically identifies the issues of Enlightenment and postmodern hubris, as well as the Protestant overreaction against church tradition. The necessary response to these obstacles must be a humility that is self-critical and willing to listen to ancient authors on their own terms, in as much as that is possible. Hall then moves on to consider the works of the eight fathers listed above, followed by a treatment of the debate that arose between the schools of Alexandria and Antioch. 

He concludes by offering a middle way between the naïve acceptance of patristic methods and content, and the outright rejection of the same. Specifically, he encourages modern exegetes to follow the fathers in four ways: read the Bible holistically as one book in two testaments, read the Bible Christologically, read the Bible in community (both past and present), and read the Bible within the context of a life of prayer, worship, and spiritual formation. This work is an excellent introduction to the subject, and offers helpful insight for pastors and scholars alike.

Be Rich in the Word: Hearing the Word

The ancient charge that God gave to Israel still applies to his people today. The Lord said to them, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one” (Deuteronomy 6:4). To hear the Lord is to listen to his words and take them to heart that we might love him with everything in us and walk in his ways. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart” (6:5-6). 

In one sense, the Lord commanded his people to hear his words because they were, for the most part, illiterate people who could not read them. But in another sense, he commanded them to hear his words because he made people in his image to be part of a living, loving relationship with him. Even as a loving father speaks to his children and makes his heart and desires known, so the Lord speaks to his people and makes his glory, will, and ways known. Even as a loving child will listen, trust, and obey her father, so the people of God are called to lovingly listen, trust, and obey their God. 

Then, as God’s people learn to hear his heart and walk in his ways, they’re called to diligently teach those ways to those with whom the Lord has given them influence. “You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise” (6:7). In other words, they’re called to be like their heavenly Father and teach his will and ways to others. They’re called to enter so deeply into his love and wisdom that they live to spread a passion for his glory and purposes. 

Since this life-giving process begins with hearing the words of God, his people are to do what they must to remind themselves to listen to him day by day. “You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates” (6:8-9). These instructions are not so much about the particulars as they are about this principle: remind yourself to listen, and then listen! 

Listen to the words of God by reading them aloud in worship services, in smaller gatherings, at home, and even at work. Listen to the words of God by taking advantage of audio Bibles or Bible apps like YouVersion. Listen to the words of God by sitting under expository preaching where the Bible is explained, illuminated, and applied to life. But whatever you do, remind yourself to listen, and then listen! 

As you do, I have one more word of wisdom for you. While it’s good to listen to large portions of the Bible and a variety of expository sermons, its better to listen to less and do more with what you hear. Train yourself to listen well, understand the meaning, and apply what you’ve heard to life. Remember that loving obedience is the goal of the regular hearing of the Word.

Living by Faith: Clinging to the Word of God

In the last two posts in this series, I’ve said that faith is hoping in God and trusting in God which are really just two ways of saying the same thing. Along the way, I’ve regularly hinted at something I want to make explicit in this post. Specifically, the practical way we trust in God is by clinging to his promises as communicated in his Word and ultimately in his Son. In Hebrews 1:1-2, the author teaches us that in the former days God spoke to his people through the prophets in a host of ways and at a variety times, but that in these last days he has spoken to us finally and decisively in Jesus Christ. God has said all he has to say in and through his Son, and he has preserved the most crucial parts of that speech in the New Testament. And now, by the power of the Holy Spirit, God communicates his will and ways through his Word to his children around the world and over time. 

So again, the way we trust in God is by clinging to his promises as communicated in his Word and ultimately in his Son. God makes promises according to his purposes, by faith through grace we receive them, and by faith through grace we live our lives accordingly. This is what it means to live by faith: we hear the Word of God, believe the Word of God, and live according to the Word of God. This is not always an easy way of life but it’s a simple way of life, and it gives some focus to the saying I shared with you in the last post, namely, you can be sure of what you hope for when you hope for what is sure. For what is sure is the being of God and the purposes of God both of which are expressed through the promises of God. When we cling to God’s promises we are indeed living our lives on a Rock rather than on sand. 

Every example of faith offered to us in chapter 11 is designed to show us how this works, that is, how we trust in God by hoping in his words. This is true even in verse 3 where creation is in view because we get the idea that the universe came into existence by the power of the words of God from the Word of God. When we wake up and walk outside and see what we see, we believe that it was created by the speech of God because the Word of God tells us that this is so. We look upon creation and live by faith because we cling to our Fathers words about creation. 

Now, at one level, God has given us enough common sense to look at the created order and figure out that some massively powerful and intelligent being made all that we see. In fact, Romans 1 tells us that creation itself is enough to hold us accountable before God and condemn us as fools if we fail to believe in him. But faith is more than common sense. Faith is more than a series of intellectual processes. Faith trusts in God by clinging to his words, and so when our Father says that he created everything out of nothing by simply speaking it into existence, we believe him, and this is faith. Faith is trusting in God by clinging to his promises through his Word.

Book Review: “Gospel-Centered Hermeneutics: Part II” (By Graeme Goldsworthy)

Goldsworthy, Graeme. “Part II: Challenges to evangelical hermeneutics.” In Gospel-Centered Hermeneutics: Foundations and Principles of Evangelical Biblical Interpretation (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2006). 

The thesis of this book is that the person and work of Jesus Christ provide not only the single focal point for proper hermeneutics but for all of reality. Therefore, an evangelical hermeneutic is gospel-driven in that it envisions Christ as the focal point of interpretation—not the theological idea of Christ, but Christ himself. Any hermeneutic that rejects, or otherwise forsakes, this central feature has ceased to be evangelical. 

The fundamental issue in evangelical hermeneutics, then, is not technique but submission to Christ and his Word. This claim does not eschew the need for extra-biblical disciplines or evidences, but it makes these things secondary to the miracle of new birth that comes by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. 

In the light of this supposition, Goldsworthy devotes section two of his work to demonstrating the ease with which potential or real crises can occur in the life of the church when the Christological center is forgotten or forsaken. He surveys “the eclipse of the gospel” in eight different epochs or disciplines, for example, in the early church and in literary criticism. Although this section is by and large a treatment of secondary literature, it is a helpful and insightful summary of issues that impacted hermeneutics in times past and present. 

Be Rich in the Word: Seven Key Disciplines

Even as the Lord created the heavens and the earth by his words, and even as he called Abraham and Israel and the church into existence by his words, so his people live, breath, and have their being by his words. So passionate was God to help his ancient people understand this truth and take it to heart, that he allowed them to endure long periods of time with little or no physical food so that they would see with their eyes and receive in their hearts the primary importance of their spiritual food, that is, the words of God. 

As Moses wrote, “And he [the Lord] humbled you [Israel] and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:3, emphasis mine). Sadly, rather than learning this lesson and delighting in their God, Israel grumbled against him and received severe discipline from him. 

Happily, many centuries later Jesus came to the earth and before his public ministry began, he was driven into the desert by the Holy Spirit where he fasted for forty days and where he was tempted by the devil. During one of his temptations, he quoted from Deuteronomy 8:3 as a way of saying that he understood the primary importance of the spiritual food of God, and that he was content with his Father’s words no matter the cost or consequence. In this way, he defeated the devil’s designs and modeled for all humankind how we are designed to live. 

Since, from God’s perspective, his people literally live by his words, then it is surely his desire that we make much of his words, not only in our thinking and speaking, but in our manner of life. Indeed, if we live by the words of our Father, let us join Jesus by delighting in the words of our Father! Or to put in the words of Paul, let’s allow the Word to dwell richly in us (Colossians 3:16-17)! 

To this end, I will be posting a series of blogs in the next several weeks that will summarize seven key disciplines: hearing the Word, reading the Word, studying the Word, meditating on the Word, memorizing the Word, applying the Word, and teaching the Word. My hope is to explain each discipline but more so to encourage us to engage in all of them. Again, since the people of God live by the Word of God, let us delight in the Word of God together! Let us be rich in the Word!