Reading Scripture

The Things I Think I Know That Guide Me in Engaging with Scripture


God is beyond our ken, abundant in mystery, and the truth of God would pop my little mind.

The point of the whole reading endeavor is to know the Living God and to live forth in great love.

Jesus, God incarnate, is the best revelation of God. To try to understand what we can about God, we look to Jesus Christ.

God’s Spirit at work is what makes the words of scripture the Living Word. Prayer and reading go hand in hand.

The words in the Bible are words of humans who are inspired by, wrestling with, enamored of, adored by God. They refract the experience of God to us. They are lenses through which we read.

We are made to be in community, and we will find more truth together, listening and responding to one another, than we will alone.

Truth is not simple or one-dimensional or found only in fact.

If the word of God is truly living and active, “sharper than any two-edged sword” and if it is to be “able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart,” I must allow it to read me. I must subject myself, my assumptions, my fears to the word of God. I must not try to be in control of the text before me. I must let it surprise, confuse, delight, heal, rebuke, challenge, encourage, uphold me.

Scripture must be read in light of scripture. The whole story needs to be read in order to better understand the part. Everything must be read in light of what we know to be most true about God.

It’s okay not to know.

God’s love is the best and most unthwartable part of the story. Test everything else you think you know against this.