Essential Skills for the Journey with Jesus
Essential Skills for the Journey with Jesus
Reading the Bible Well (Pt. 1).
“I read novels but I also read the Bible. And study it, you know? And the more I learn, the more excited I get.” -Johnny Cash
Reading the Bible is essential for following Jesus; whether inside the church or outside in our everyday life. In this series of posts, we will practice four practical lessons to help us read the Bible well. Let’s begin with the first lessons.
First lesson: We must allow the Bible to do the same thing our favorite books and movies do. Scripture should draw us out of our world and into theirs. Many of us approach the Bible with an agenda already in mind. We try to draw what we read into our world. But to read anything well, including the Bible, we must abandon ourselves to the storyline of the text.
A great place to practice this first lesson is by reading the book of Ruth. It is a tight, well-written short story you can read or listen to in about 15 minutes. It is an ancient story so you may not understand some details. But you will be able to enter into the narrative world. Get to know Ruth this week in preparation for our second lesson in the next post.