Wrong Way to Read the Bible

Wrong Way to Read the Bible
By: Kevin Bauder
Kevin T. Bauder – Central Baptist Theological Seminary of Minneapolis – 900 Forestview Ln N, Plymouth, MN 55441 | 1-800-827-1043 | www.centralseminary.edu

If the Bible is God’s Word, then why does it come to us as such an (apparently) random collection of diverse literature? In one place we find stories, in another we find legal codes, and in another, epic poems. Here we read correspondence and there we discover verses of song. Some documents contain didactic reasoning, but others give us apocalypses.

Would it not have been better if God had simply sent us an inspired and inerrant systematic theology? Or better still, He might have given us two lists: one of propositions about Himself and the other of commands for us to obey. Would not life and faith be simpler?

Nevertheless, we have been given the Bible. God is the one who gave it. God is the one who inspired it. God is the one who commands its use. Why is the Bible that we have better than a systematic theology (however perfect) or a list of propositions and obligations?

The fundamental reason is that no list of discursive propositions can possibly communicate the multi-faceted nature of God’s glory. God is infinite in His majesty and, consequently, infinitely variegated in His splendor. Part of the purpose of the Bible is to help us glimpse the many dimensions of God’s grandeur.

That would be difficult—perhaps impossible—to do with mere theological propositions. True, God could give us a proposition to the effect that His glory has many dimensions. We could read such a proposition and intellectually affirm it without ever beginning to glimpse the glory itself. God does not simply want us to know and affirm that He is glorious, He wishes us to behold His glory. He wishes to place Himself on display.

More than that, God wants us to know Him. That is not at all the same thing as knowing about Him. We can learn about Him from propositions. We can gather theological data, categorize it, and publish theologies. Nevertheless, however much data we amass, it will do us no good unless we know Him.

An analogymay clarify the difference. Consider a young man who notices a young woman and wants to get to know her. Through various means he secures copies of her medical records, her high school and college transcripts, and her bank statements. He hires a detective to investigate her, find out who her friends are, where she spends her time, and what her preferences are. He immerses himself in the reports and gains significant factual knowledge about her.

When the young woman finds out what he has been doing, she will not feel flattered. She will feel alarmed. She may speak to the police or seek an injunction from a court. Although the young man has mastered a great many facts, he does not know her. He has never developed a relationship with her. In the absence of a trusting relationship, his knowledge about her is an intrusion into her privacy and a violation of her personhood. The sooner his stalking ends, the better.

In our understanding of God, we often behave just like that young man. We treat the Bible the same way that the young man was treating the medical records, transcripts, and bank statements. We seek for factual data about God, but we do it in the absence of a personal, loving, and trusting relationship. We should not be surprised when God resists us and hides His face from us.

This use of the Bible is akin to pornography. It is a kind of voyeuristic leering into the world of the divine. God does reveal Himself, but not in order to satisfy our idle curiosity. When we read the Bible in order to gather mere facts, we shame ourselves and profane holy things.

Reading the Bible ought to be much more like entering into a conversation. What we read should not terminate in our minds, but should pass on into our hearts. In turn, our hearts should respond to God’s self-disclosure, welcoming it, treasuring it, reflecting upon it, and answering it. Our hearts should answer with adoration when God puts Himself on display. They should respond with obedience to His merest wish (let alone His command). They should respond with confession, with submission, with petition. Above all, they should respond with delight and rejoicing to have been invited into the innermost chamber of divine intimacy.

Too often, we draw a distinction between reading the Bible for study and reading the Bible for devotion. We read it for exegetical purposes, then we throw the switch and read it for edification. Another flip of the switch and we are studying for sermon preparation, but then we switch again and find ourselves in meditation mode.

This switching back and forth produces two problems. The first is that we should never read the Bible without reading it devotionally. The toughest exegetical work should nevertheless yield fruit in our walk with God. The second problem is that if we keep flipping that switch, sooner or later it will get stuck, and it usually gets stuck in intellectual mode. When we accustom ourselves to reading the Bible for information only, we soon lose sight of the God whose communion we ought to crave.

The Bible does contain factual information about God, but that information is nearly always couched in the elements of personal encounter. We do not find factual abstractions in the pages of Scripture. Rather, we read stories about how God has worked in the lives of His people. We discover poems that express the innermost movements of spiritual experience. We encounter vivid imagery that sparks our imaginations and draws us into God’s work in the world. Indeed, the Bible taken as a whole is one long story—the story of God. As we read the story and enter into it, we do not simply encounter information. We encounter Him.

God makes Himself present in the pages of Scripture. The Bible is alive with His person and work. In the biblical tapestry of literary genres and authorial styles we find that God displays the manifold nature of His glory. He invites us into its pages in order that we might meet Him, know Him, and love Him. Because God is present in the Bible, it is our chief treasure on earth. If we have a Bible to read and nothing else, we are still inestimably rich. Let us not neglect the wealth that God has showered upon us.

This was one of Kevin Bauder’s writings that he shares with any that request them. I thought this expressed good information about how one aught not read the Bible.  LDW