4 Life-Changing Ideas about Bible Study

4 Life-Changing Ideas about Bible Study by John D. Barry Imagine a collection of books that allowed for you to everyday hear the very voice of God. Consider adding to that collection stories of righteous prophets, holy wars, acts of valor, and slaves being freed. And then, throw into that collection personal prison letters, a God who came to earth, and more. Then, envision the entire collection being ancient, from another time, but still incredibly relevant. You already know I’m talking about the Bible. Now, let’s go through four steps to take Bible study from dull to incredible. 1. Change the subject of your study. This next point is spoken shockingly little, and I think it’s because we don’t outright want to admit why our Bible study is seems boring. The Bible is a means to an end—it’s a means to knowing God as Creator, Jesus who came to earth, and Spirit present with believers. God is the subject of the Bible, and should be the subject of our study. It is not the Bible we worship, but the living God, who came to this very earth as a human, as Jesus, to die for all of our wrongdoings and rise again. If our Bible study is focused on the Bible, we’re really missing the point. Boring study is introduced when we think of the Bible like any other historical work or like a textbook. Jesus himself makes this point to some Jews of his time, “You search the scriptures because you think that you have eternal life in them, and it is these that testify about me. And you are not willing to come to me so that you may have life” (John 5:39–40 LEB). 2. Picture it as a movie. The Bible is full of epic battle scenes and intense drama (read 1–2 Samuel or Acts). In our overly saturated, visual culture, many of us have lost our imaginations. We rely on others to imagine for us, in the forms of movies and other mediums. I think this is tragic because it’s in imagination that we find the will power to make the world a better place. The patriarchs of Israel, the few great kings over God’s people, and the righteous prophets, were great visionaries of a better life. They studied God’s past actions (often through the oral tradition of the time) and then prayerfully sought the will of God for the present. Through times of prayer they were able to see what others could not—a life lived for God, full of spiritual (and often physical) plenty. This vision is carried forward with Jesus’ disciples, who have an opportunity to execute the vision of the living God on earth. And we too are meant to imagine the past, both as it was and as it could have been, so that we can envision a better future. Finish Reading Your Devotional Online >>