When I explain the gospel, I need to say more than that God wants to improve someone’s life. The good news concerns what Jesus Christ has done for sinners: He shed His blood and died for our sins, was buried, and rose bodily from the dead. God calls us to repent and believe in Him. A person can agree that Christianity sounds beneficial without understanding why he needs that Savior.
The Greek word euangelion, translated gospel, means good news or a glad announcement. The message begins with God’s initiative in sending His Son. It calls for repentance and faith because He has provided a Savior, rather than promising to save us once we prove capable of improving ourselves.
If all I tell someone is that God has a wonderful plan for his life, I may encourage him while leaving his guilt unaddressed. He needs to hear why Christ shed His blood and rose from the dead, and what it means to repent and believe. We need to explain the judgment our sin deserves if he is to understand why forgiveness is good news.
The Bad News We Must Face
In Romans 3, Paul includes both Jews and Gentiles in the same verdict. Neither group can establish its righteousness before God, and the Jews’ religious privileges do not make their sin any less real:
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Romans 3:23
The verb hamartano, translated sinned, can carry the sense of missing the mark. In Romans, the standard is God’s glory and righteousness, and the offense is our failure to give our Creator the obedience and worship we owe Him. The phrase cannot excuse disobedience as though we had merely made a harmless miscalculation.
If I have deceived someone, pointing to a more dishonest man does nothing to remove my guilt. A decent reputation cannot make the deception honest, and years of religious activity cannot undo it. The person whose sins are concealed needs forgiveness just as much as the person whose wrongdoing has become public.
Jesus confronted this self-righteousness after calling Matthew from the tax office. He shared a meal with tax collectors and sinners, and the Pharisees questioned His disciples about the company He kept. Jesus answered by explaining a physician’s purpose:
Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.
Matthew 9:12-13
Jesus was not telling the Pharisees they were righteous enough to do without a Savior. They objected to the mercy He showed people they regarded as sinners while failing to acknowledge their own need for it. If I insist that I am already well, I will not recognize my own need for the Physician.
Isaiah had exposed a similar refusal to face sin in Judah. The people needed God’s saving intervention, but the Lord had not lost the ability to save or hear. Their violence and injustice had separated them from Him.
But your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you.
Isaiah 59:2
Sin leaves us guilty before the holy God and breaks fellowship with Him. Becoming more disciplined cannot erase what we have done. Even making amends with someone we harmed does not, by itself, reconcile us to the Lord. We need Him to deal with our guilt and bring us back to Himself.
Paul develops the consequences of sin in Romans 6, where he contrasts slavery to sin with the freedom believers receive in Christ. He concludes by describing what sin pays and what God gives:
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23
Paul calls death the wages of sin because it is a consequence our wrongdoing deserves, while eternal life is God’s gift in Jesus Christ to people who cannot earn it. Scripture speaks of physical death and the spiritual separation caused by sin, and it also warns of final judgment. The unredeemed dead will be raised and judged before being cast into the lake of fire, called the second death. I understand that as the final, irreversible destruction of body and soul. The gospel offers rescue from a real judgment, rather than reassurance that God will overlook our guilt.
Promised From the Beginning
God began promising that rescue long before the New Testament. Genesis 3 records Eve being deceived by the serpent and Adam knowingly disobeying God. Both sinned, and they hid from Him after becoming conscious of their shame. While pronouncing judgment on the serpent, God announced that the woman’s Seed would be wounded but would crush the serpent’s head.
And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.
Genesis 3:15
This promise points to the Deliverer who would defeat Satan, although it does not yet disclose everything later Scripture reveals about Christ. God was already announcing the rescue sinners needed. Through His covenants and the priesthood, He would teach His people more about that salvation. The prophets would also speak of the coming King’s suffering before victory.
Abraham also helps us understand how people receive what God promises. In Genesis 15, Abram was still childless despite the promise that he would become a great nation. God pointed him to the stars and promised descendants beyond counting.
And he believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.
Genesis 15:6
God accounted righteousness to Abram because he believed the Lord. He had not manufactured a righteousness of his own or made God indebted to him. Old Testament believers trusted the God who promised to save, although they did not know every detail of the cross and empty tomb. They were saved by grace through faith on the basis of the Redeemer He would provide. Teaching that they earned salvation by works while we receive it freely would misrepresent both their need and God’s provision.
God later instructed Israel about sin and approaching Him through the sacrifices He appointed under the Law. Sin and guilt offerings addressed wrongdoing. Peace offerings emphasized fellowship and could be given in thanksgiving, while the burnt offering expressed complete dedication and also made atonement. Their purposes differed, but blood was central to sacrificial atonement. In Leviticus 17, God explained that He had given blood on the altar and therefore prohibited eating it.
For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls.
Leviticus 17:11
God provided atonement, a way of dealing with sin so His people could approach Him. Yet Israel’s offerings could not provide the final cleansing the worshipers needed. Their repetition showed that something more was required, as Paul explains in Hebrews:
For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices make those who approach perfect.
Hebrews 10:1
The high priest returned to the Day of Atonement service year after year because the final offering had not yet been made. Christ was the perfect, sinless sacrifice those offerings anticipated, and He voluntarily gave Himself to be slain for our sins. Wicked men betrayed, mocked, beat, and crucified Him. The blood He shed and the life He gave accomplished the redemption those earlier sacrifices could not provide.
Paul calls God’s act of declaring the believer righteous justification. That standing is given freely through Christ’s redemption, the deliverance He secured at the cost of His life:
being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith.
Romans 3:24-25
Propitiation concerns the atoning provision through which God righteously grants mercy to sinners. Paul identifies Christ’s shed blood as that provision, received through faith. In the rest of his explanation, God remains just while justifying the person who has faith in Jesus. He forgives through the sacrifice He provided, rather than by dismissing our guilt.
The Father did not punish His innocent Son, abandon Him, or pour wrath upon Him. Father and Son acted in unity to provide our salvation. Jesus willingly endured the suffering wicked people inflicted as He gave His blood and life for us. Reducing the cross to an inspiring example would leave out the sacrifice through which God has provided mercy.
Christ the Fulfillment
The promised Redeemer is God’s eternal Son. In Galatians 3-4, Paul compares the Law’s temporary authority with a child’s life under guardians. The child is an heir, but he remains under their care until the time his father appoints. Paul then describes God sending His Son at the appointed time to redeem those under the Law and receive them as His children:
But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law.
Galatians 4:4-5
Jesus became fully man without ceasing to be fully God. He was born of a virgin and lived without sin, revealing the Father and perfectly obeying Him. God did not lower His standard to accommodate our wrongdoing. His Son willingly offered His sinless body and blood for the sins of the whole world.
Hebrews contrasts the priests who continued offering sacrifices with Christ’s completed offering. Paul describes believers as sanctified, or set apart, through the offering of His body:
By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Hebrews 10:10
His shed blood and death completed the atonement before His burial and bodily resurrection. The following verses in Hebrews contrast priests standing to offer sacrifices repeatedly with Christ seated after His one sacrifice. No priest can repeat that accomplishment or supply something it lacked. My suffering cannot complete it either, and law-keeping or a religious ritual cannot make me worthy of what He has done. Treating human merit as part of the basis for acceptance with God is legalism, and it contradicts the completeness of Christ’s offering.
That completed atonement does not make Christ’s resurrection optional. When some in Corinth denied the future resurrection of the dead, Paul answered by reminding them that Christ’s resurrection belonged to the gospel they had received:
For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.
1 Corinthians 15:3-4
Jesus truly died and was buried, then rose bodily on the third day. Paul goes on to name people who saw Him, including more than five hundred at once. He was making claims about events and witnesses, not describing how the disciples kept their teacher’s ideals alive.
In the same chapter, Paul says that if Christ has not risen, our faith is futile and we remain in our sins. His resurrection vindicates who He is and confirms the saving work He completed through His blood and death.
Paul also connects the resurrection with our justification in Romans 4:
who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification.
Romans 4:25
Romans 4 applies Abraham’s example of faith to those who believe in the God who raised Jesus from the dead. We trust a living Savior who conquered death. Many people died on Roman crosses, but the gospel announces that the sinless Son died for our sins, fulfilling Scripture, and rose again. He is our only Savior and Mediator, the One through whom we come to God.
Repentance and Faith
Jesus Himself called people to repent and believe. Early in His ministry, after John the Baptist’s imprisonment, He began preaching in Galilee:
The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.
Mark 1:15
Years later, Paul described the same response while speaking to the Ephesian elders at Miletus. Looking back over his public and house-to-house ministry, he summarized what he had preached to Jews and Greeks:
testifying to Jews, and also to Greeks, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.
Acts 20:21
Repentance turns a person from rebellion toward God, and faith trusts Jesus Christ as the only Savior. I cannot honestly claim to trust Him while insisting that He has no authority over my life. But turning to Him does not give me something to offer as payment. Neither my repentance nor the strength of my decision accomplishes the salvation He alone provides.
God’s invitation extends to every hearer. Jesus spoke of God’s love for the world and promised everlasting life to whoever believes in Him:
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
John 3:16
Christ died for the whole world, so I can offer the gospel honestly to every person. I do not have to wonder whether the sinner in front of me is someone for whom no Savior was provided. People can resist and reject God’s genuine offer, and those who reject Christ remain condemned. Their unbelief cannot be blamed on Him withholding a genuine opportunity to respond.
Receiving His offer does not make salvation a human achievement. Ephesians 2 describes people dead in trespasses and sins, following the world and living according to corrupted desires. God makes believers alive with Christ because He is rich in mercy.
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
Ephesians 2:8-9
Grace gives what we have not earned, and faith receives Christ and relies on Him. I cannot point to my religious background or my decision and claim that I made myself worthy of forgiveness. God has provided the Savior and gives the new life. Paul then explains the place of good works in the lives of those He saves:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
Ephesians 2:10
When someone is genuinely born again, God gives him new life that should become evident in his conduct. A man who has been dishonest ought to learn to tell the truth and stop defending his deceit, although he will still need instruction and correction. Those changes are evidence of salvation already received; they are not a means of paying for forgiveness.
The claim that grace frees us from obeying God’s moral commands is called antinomianism. If I mistreat another person and insist that grace means God is unconcerned about it, I am turning His mercy into an excuse for disobedience. Christ saves people from slavery to sin and gives them a new life in which to follow Him.
Paul condemned the teaching pressed on the Galatian churches when Gentile believers were told they needed circumcision and law observance to be accepted by God. Making those observances necessary alongside Christ’s work changed the basis of salvation. That is why he treated the message as another gospel, rather than a cultural preference:
But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.
Galatians 1:8
A message can also corrupt the gospel by changing Christ’s identity or setting aside His finished work. Prosperity teaching holds out earthly gain as the reason to come to Him, while a merely therapeutic message may offer comfort without confronting sin. Universalism promises that everyone will eventually be saved, removing the final danger Scripture attaches to rejecting Christ. Whatever encouragement, wealth, or improved behavior a message offers, it cannot substitute for the forgiveness sinners need through Him.
I reject Calvinist limited atonement because I believe Christ died for the whole world. The disagreement concerns the intended extent of His atoning death, rather than whether His blood has infinite worth. I do not believe salvation was provided only for the elect; God’s offer is sincere to every person. I also reject the Arminian teaching that genuinely born-again believers can lose salvation. People can resist God’s appeal, but those who repent and believe are made new and kept by Him.
When assessing a message, I need to consider more than whether the speaker sounds compassionate, morally serious, or impressive. A large crowd and a claim of spiritual power cannot establish that he is teaching the truth. I need to compare his explanation with the apostolic gospel preserved in Scripture: the truth about our sin, Christ’s full deity and humanity, His shed blood and bodily resurrection, and the call to repentance and faith. Salvation must remain God’s gift of grace that brings a person into new life.
For those who believe that gospel, assurance rests on Christ. In Ephesians 1, Paul praises God for the blessings believers have in Him and describes their hearing the gospel, trusting Christ, and being sealed by the Holy Spirit:
In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise.
Ephesians 1:13
Jesus also promised security to His sheep. During the Feast of Dedication, opponents surrounded Him in the temple and demanded that He tell them plainly whether He was the Christ. He told them they were not His sheep, then described those who heard His voice and followed Him.
And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.
John 10:28
In the whole passage, their safety is in His hand and the Father’s hand. He gives them eternal life and promises they will never perish. The Holy Spirit lives in those genuinely born again and seals them as God’s own. Their obedience neither earns nor keeps salvation, because Christ is the One who keeps them. They may stumble and need to confess sin, but their weakness does not make His promise fail.
That promise should never be used to excuse a superficial claim without regeneration, which means genuine new birth. Baptism, church attendance, or repeating a prayer cannot take the Savior’s place. Neither can a Christian upbringing or a decent reputation. If I am relying on those things instead of Christ, I need to turn to Him. If I am trusting Him and grieving my weakness, I have reason to take heart in His promise as I learn to follow Him.
My Final Thoughts
I want someone hearing the gospel to understand both his guilt and the mercy God has provided. Jesus Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose bodily from the dead. His blood is sufficient for the whole world, and He receives those who repent and believe. I cannot earn that forgiveness or complete His sacrifice, but I can trust the living Savior who makes His people new and keeps them forever.
Someone can quote every word of a Bible verse correctly and still use it to teach something the passage never said. Before I ask how a verse applies to my life, I need to understand what the writer was saying. That takes some patience, especially if the passage challenges a belief I have held for years. But if I believe this is God’s Word, I ought to be willing to hear Him out.
God Breathed Out His Word
Near the end of his life, Paul reminded Timothy of the Scriptures he had known from childhood. Timothy would have to confront false teaching and minister to people who didn’t want to hear sound doctrine. A likable personality wouldn’t equip him to recognize error, and telling people what they preferred to hear would only make the problem worse. Paul directed him back to the Word God had given.
All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.
2 Timothy 3:16
The expression “given by inspiration of God” means more than we usually mean when we describe an inspiring speech. The Greek word theopneustos means God-breathed. Paul is identifying the source of Scripture. God used human writers, with their own vocabulary and circumstances, to write what He intended His people to receive as His Word.
Paul also explains why God gave it. Scripture teaches doctrine, which is what we believe and teach. It reproves us by exposing error and sin, corrects us so we can put things right, and instructs us in righteous living. The next verse completes his thought:
that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.
2 Timothy 3:17
God intends His Word to equip His people for the work He calls them to do. A commentary can help explain a difficult verse, but its author has no authority to overrule what God said. The commentator’s teaching must be judged by Scripture, just as Timothy’s teaching had to be.
Peter describes how the Holy Spirit worked through the men who gave us Scripture:
knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.
2 Peter 1:20-21
I understand Peter’s reference to private interpretation in light of the explanation he gives immediately afterward: prophecy did not originate in man’s will. He isn’t telling ordinary believers that they have no right to read and understand Scripture. The prophets weren’t inventing religious ideas and asking God to endorse them. They spoke as the Holy Spirit moved them, so we need to seek the meaning God intended through their words.
Since Scripture has that authority, I cannot make an exception for my own opinions. Tradition, academic credentials, and a favorite preacher’s reputation cannot settle a question against Scripture. Neither can the fact that I have defended a particular interpretation for a long time. If the passage corrects me, admitting I was mistaken is a more faithful response than devising another argument to protect my pride.
Bring a Humble Heart and Read the Context
Being willing to receive that correction is part of preparing to study. Scripture can teach a child the way of salvation, yet an experienced teacher can still struggle with a difficult passage. Both need God’s help. The psalmist asked for it plainly:
Open my eyes, that I may see Wondrous things from Your law.
Psalm 119:18
We can pray that same prayer and then give careful attention to what we read. Asking God for understanding doesn’t relieve me of the responsibility to follow a sentence or look up an unfamiliar word. I am asking Him to help me understand His Word, including the parts I might be inclined to explain away.
James tells those who lack wisdom to ask God, but he also warns against being double-minded. If I ask for God’s direction while intending to disregard whatever interferes with my plans, I am hardly approaching Him honestly. Later in the chapter, James describes how we should receive His Word:
Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.
James 1:21
To receive the Word with meekness, I have to be willing to learn even when I would rather defend myself. Someone may explain a complicated theological argument and still refuse a straightforward command to repent. His knowledge doesn’t excuse the refusal, because God gave that instruction to correct how he lives as well as what he believes.
When we read, we need to give the writer enough room to explain himself. A sentence belongs to a paragraph, and the paragraph develops an argument or describes events within a larger book. Ask who is speaking, who is being addressed, and what prompted the statement. Read what comes before your verse and continue far enough afterward to follow the thought. Sometimes the answer to a difficult question is sitting a few lines above it.
Notice the small connecting words too. A writer’s therefore tells us that his conclusion rests on something he has already explained. If we skip that explanation, we can misunderstand why he is giving the instruction. Repeated words, changes of speaker, and details about time and place can also keep us from misreading what happened.
Philippians 4:13 is a familiar example of what happens when we neglect the surrounding passage. Paul says he can do all things through Christ, but the preceding sentences explain what he means. He had learned contentment when he was hungry or well-fed, in need or living with plenty. Christ strengthens him to remain faithful through those circumstances. If I use that verse to guarantee that I will win a competition or achieve a business ambition, I have made Paul promise something he wasn’t discussing.
We also need to recognize the kind of writing, often called its genre. A historical account reports events, while a psalm may express truth through vivid imagery. A proverb gives a general principle of wisdom rather than an unconditional promise about every individual circumstance. Letters address particular people or churches, and prophecy may describe real events through symbols. We already recognize differences like these in ordinary reading; we should give Scripture the same care.
Helping people understand the passage this way is part of a teacher’s responsibility. When the returned exiles gathered to hear the Law, the men teaching them explained what was being read.
So they read distinctly from the book, in the Law of God; and they gave the sense, and helped them to understand the reading.
Nehemiah 8:8
A gifted speaker can hold an audience’s attention without explaining the Bible very well. The people hearing him still need to understand the words on the page. They also have a responsibility to examine what they are being taught, as the Bereans did when Paul brought them the gospel.
These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.
Acts 17:11
They were eager to listen, yet they searched the Scriptures to find out whether Paul’s message was true. If they could examine an apostle’s teaching, we certainly aren’t being disrespectful when we check a modern preacher’s explanation. We can test an appealing claim without assuming the speaker is dishonest. His confidence does not remove our responsibility to examine what he says.
Observe, Understand, and Respond
A useful way to organize our study is to observe what a passage says, work out what it means, and then consider how we should respond. Those steps are commonly called observation, interpretation, and application. They keep us from deciding on a personal lesson before we understand the passage we are trying to apply.
Observation means attending to what is actually there. Who is acting or speaking? Is the writer giving a command, making a promise, answering an objection, or recording someone else’s conduct? Follow his reasons through to his conclusion. We aren’t collecting details just to fill a notebook; we are trying to understand how the words fit together.
Interpretation seeks the meaning the human writer intended under God, the divine Author. You may hear this called exegesis, drawing the meaning out of the text. Its opposite is eisegesis, reading an idea into the text that didn’t come from it. A verse may sound useful to an argument I want to make, but I still have to ask whether the writer was making that argument.
Application follows from the meaning we have established. Consider James’s instruction:
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
James 1:22
He compares an unresponsive hearer to a man who looks in a mirror, walks away, and forgets what he saw. Hearing the truth can leave us deceived if we mistake that hearing for obedience. If Scripture exposes a lie I told my employer, I haven’t dealt with it by underlining a verse about honesty. I need to confess the lie, tell the truth, and repair the harm where I can. My response has to address what God has exposed.
Other passages may correct a mistaken belief, restore confidence in God’s promises, or change what we ask Him for. We don’t have to manufacture a dramatic decision after every reading. We do need to take seriously whatever the passage actually teaches. A completed worksheet is useful only if it has helped us understand and respond to that teaching.
Let Scripture Help Explain Scripture
As questions arise, we can compare related passages because the God who gave Scripture does not lie or contradict Himself. That doesn’t mean every passage is equally easy. Peter acknowledged that some things in Paul’s letters were hard to understand. Clearer passages help us examine difficult ones without reaching conclusions that contradict what God has plainly said elsewhere.
Paul described the message he and the other apostles taught as coming from the Holy Spirit:
These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
1 Corinthians 2:13
Paul’s confidence rested on the Spirit’s teaching rather than human wisdom. When we compare Scripture, we are reading words given by the same Spirit, so we should expect their teaching to agree. We still have to understand each passage in its own setting. Finding the same word in two books doesn’t prove it has precisely the same meaning in both, and a promise made to Israel under a particular covenant doesn’t automatically become my private guarantee.
We need that same care when comparing passages about salvation. Christ died for the whole world, and we receive salvation through faith rather than earn it by works. God’s offer is genuine and can be rejected, yet those who have truly been born again are sealed and kept by Him. An explanation that dismisses one of those teachings to defend another hasn’t accounted for the full testimony of Scripture. We should be just as careful when studying judgment instead of building a doctrine on one image and disregarding clearer descriptions elsewhere.
When a passage uses an image, we need to understand what it communicates in its setting. I believe in literal interpretation, by which I mean reading according to normal grammar, historical setting, and the kind of language being used. That allows a metaphor to function as a metaphor and receives a historical account as history. Recognizing symbols in prophecy doesn’t give us permission to erase the promises those symbols communicate.
Genesis presents creation, the first man and woman, the entrance of sin and death, the Flood, and the genealogies as history. Jesus grounded His teaching on marriage in creation, and Paul connected Adam’s sin with death while explaining the life we receive through Christ. If we turn those events into vague symbols to accommodate outside objections, we have also changed the history on which those later teachings rest.
Historical events can also point ahead to Christ. We call this typology: an earlier person, event, or institution anticipates something later in God’s plan. The Passover lamb points to Christ, and the tabernacle teaches through patterns and shadows. Jesus used Jonah’s three days as a sign, and Paul gave an inspired allegorical explanation involving Hagar and Sarah in Galatians. Scripture authorizes those connections. It doesn’t authorize us to assign a hidden spiritual meaning to every detail that catches our interest.
A theory that depends on a secret key Christians supposedly missed for centuries deserves careful examination. Novelty can attract attention without providing evidence. Before accepting it, look at how its teacher handles the actual wording and context. If he has to ignore both to make his explanation work, we have good reason to reject his conclusion, however intriguing it first sounded.
Keep Every Study Tool Under the Text
Begin with a readable translation. Public English quotations in these studies use the NKJV. The textual foundation is the Hebrew Masoretic Text for the Old Testament and the Textus Receptus for the New Testament. The Textus Receptus is a printed Greek text drawn largely from the Byzantine manuscript tradition; it is not identical to every Byzantine manuscript or to a modern Majority Text edition.
I believe God preserved His words for His people. These studies therefore use the received text rather than treating Scripture as something finally recovered through modern critical reconstruction. That doesn’t make each printed edition or translator inspired. An English translation still needs to represent the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek faithfully. The study on the Textus Receptus and received text explains this further.
From there, use resources to answer the questions you encounter. Cross-references can direct you to a quotation’s source, a parallel account, or a related teaching. A concordance helps locate other occurrences of a word, while a Bible dictionary explains unfamiliar people, places, customs, and objects. A commentary offers another student’s explanation and may raise a question you hadn’t considered. None of these resources has authority to dictate what the passage is allowed to say.
Greek and Hebrew tools can be helpful too. A lexicon is a dictionary of the original language that explains how words are used. An interlinear places those words beside a translation. They can help clarify a translator’s choice, but access to them doesn’t make someone proficient in the language. If a dictionary lists six possible meanings, we can’t assume the writer intended all six at once. We have to determine which meaning fits his sentence.
A word’s root also cannot establish a doctrine on its own, and a confident claim about grammar needs support from the language. Knowing a little can make us overconfident about what we actually understand. That is a reason to study carefully, not to dismiss language study. God gave the Old Testament in Hebrew and Aramaic and the New Testament in Greek; responsible work in those languages helps us understand His words more accurately.
Reliable historical and cultural background can explain something the original readers already knew. It becomes a problem when an outside theory overrules the wording of the passage. We should apply the same scrutiny to a respected teacher. He may be exceptionally helpful, but he is still capable of being wrong.
Test all things; hold fast what is good.
1 Thessalonians 5:21
I don’t want someone to become so dependent on my explanation that he stops examining Scripture for himself. A teacher should help people become stronger readers. If consulting him leaves them less willing to question his conclusions, something has gone wrong with that relationship.
Read Toward Christ and Become a Doer
As we learn to read individual passages, we also need to understand how they fit within God’s work of redemption. Luke 24 records how the risen Jesus explained what Moses and the Prophets had written concerning Him. Later in the chapter, He also directed His disciples to what the Psalms revealed.
And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.
Luke 24:27
The Law reveals God’s holiness and exposes our sin. The sacrifices teach us about guilt, shed blood, and the need for a substitute. The prophets announce judgment and promise restoration, while Israel’s failing kings show the need for a righteous King. The Psalms teach worship and express suffering and hope. We can follow those connections without forcing an imagined reference to Jesus into every detail. The study on the Word of the Lord in the Old Testament examines how God progressively made Himself known.
That revelation leads us to the eternal Son, who became fully man without ceasing to be fully God and lived without sin. Jesus willingly gave Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Wicked men tortured Him on the cross, shed His innocent blood, and killed Him. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus; Father and Son remained united in redemption. Christ’s saving sacrifice was complete through His shed blood and death. He was then buried and rose bodily from the grave.
Christ died for the whole world, and God’s offer of salvation to every person is genuine. People can resist that offer, but everyone who repents and believes receives forgiveness and everlasting life. The person who is born again becomes a new creation and is indwelt and sealed by the Holy Spirit. Genuine salvation is eternally secure. Calling myself a Christian without evidence of that new life is no basis for assurance, and God’s keeping of His people gives us no excuse for lawlessness.
Keeping redemption in view prevents us from reducing the Bible to advice for getting ahead. David’s encounter with Goliath teaches more than finding courage, and Joseph’s life involves far more than waiting patiently for a promotion. Proverbs teaches wisdom, but it isn’t a collection of guarantees for personal success. Those passages belong within the work of the God who created us, judges sin, keeps His promises, and provides salvation. We need to understand their place there before drawing whatever lesson happens to appeal to us.
God’s Word also examines the person studying it. We can become so occupied with answering someone else’s questions that we evade what God is exposing in us.
For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Hebrews 4:12
Sometimes Scripture comforts us when we are frightened or grieving. At other times it confronts an excuse we have carefully maintained. If I have convinced myself that my anger is justified, a passage about bitterness and forgiveness may be unwelcome, but dismissing it won’t make my conduct right. Learning more theological terms or winning a debate cannot replace repentance. The God who strengthens us in suffering also loves us enough to correct us.
We must also keep obedience in its biblical place. Studying diligently and improving our conduct cannot earn salvation, which we receive by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Good works grow from the new life He gives us. We aren’t working to purchase His forgiveness, but we shouldn’t use His grace to rationalize ignoring the instruction He gave for our good.
Paul made Timothy’s responsibility as a teacher particularly clear:
Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
2 Timothy 2:15
The expression “rightly dividing” calls for accurate handling of God’s Word. Later in that chapter, Paul names teachers who were saying the resurrection had already taken place and were overturning the faith of some. His warning gives us reason to be careful about what we teach. I want to stand before the Lord without being ashamed of how I handled His words, and that requires more than devising clever divisions that impress an audience.
If you are new to studying the Bible, begin with a manageable passage. Pray for understanding, read the surrounding paragraphs, and consider what the original readers would have understood. Compare relevant passages and consult a reliable resource when you need help. You will learn to recognize different kinds of writing and follow difficult arguments with practice. There is no reason to be embarrassed about asking a mature believer for help. Some questions will require sustained work, but we don’t need every difficult question answered before trusting and obeying what God has made clear.
Make room for broad reading as well as close study. Reading through whole books introduces us to passages we might otherwise neglect and helps us see how the parts fit together. Slower study lets us examine a particular argument in detail. You can also follow a subject through several books, as the study on the name of the Lord does in tracing what God reveals about Himself through His name.
My Final Thoughts
I want to understand the Bible well enough to teach it faithfully, but that has to include receiving its correction myself. If a passage exposes a belief I need to reconsider or a sin I need to confess, I shouldn’t evade it just because changing would be uncomfortable. God has given us His Word so we can know Him through Jesus Christ and learn to live as His people. Let’s give it the care and obedience it deserves.
