I must admit, before even diving into this topic, that I'm writing about points that may seem really obvious. However, I've come to learn that people often don't put these points into practice. And I must admit, for much of my life, I also failed to do the obvious when it came to Scripture. As the title of this post indicates, I'm talking about context...the vital necessity of studying, learning, teaching, and living by Scripture in context.
Several years ago, I attended a seminar at church that hit me pretty hard with the reality of how often we miss key messages in Scripture. We tend to focus on the portion that applies to our own lives. We’re concerned about the truth in God’s Word as it relates to our own relationship with Christ. And in our desire to glean the promises that apply specifically to our own lives, we miss God’s heart for other people, God’s heart for the nations. Let me give a very simple example, an example that was used in the seminar that brought me to a point of conviction. Finish the following well-known verse:
Psalm 46:10 – “Be still, and…”
Congratulations if you finished the verse with “know that I am God”. You are of the majority of those I know who know 1/3 of the verse! What??? There is more to the verse??? How often do we ever hear more than just “Be still, and know that I am God”? Ummm…hardly ever! So, what is the whole verse?
Psalm 46:10 – “Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!”
So why don’t we hear the other 2/3 of the verse all that often? This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. The conclusion I’ve come to is that the last 2/3 of the verse really doesn’t seem to have much to do with us directly. It’s all about God. (Gasp!) Yes, I’m saying that we tend to care more about what concerns us that we do about what God says about Himself and also His heart for the nations. Yes, I’m saying we tend to be very self-centered. From the very beginning of our own personal existence, we’re focused on ourselves. And it’s only by the hand of God that we can ever take our eyes off of ourselves in order to see God and others. Frank Turk had a blog post a few months ago about Jonah, which talks about this very issue. It’s pretty challenging and will give some good insight into this.
I admit, after being hit with the realization that so few know 2/3 of Psalm 46:10, quoting only the first 1/3 of the verse has become a pet peeve of mine. And over the past year, as I’ve been digging into God’s Word even more than before, taking verses out of context has also joined my list of pet peeves.
Now that I’ve mentioned pet peeves, I do want to make a comment before going further. In thinking of this post (which I’ve wanted to write for a few months now), I’ve been so hesitant about writing a seemingly negative post. It’s not my intention to come across in with a really strong negative tone, though I know this is a risk I’m taking in such a post. However, I hope you will be challenged to dig further and deeper into God’s Word in order to learn and grow in His Truth.
As I started memorizing Scripture last summer, I found myself “stumbling” upon verses I had often heard throughout the years. My reaction to some of these verses was rather unexpected. Nathan often heard me say things like “So, that’s what that means?” It became a huge wake-up call to me how much some verses were taken out of context and some even interpreted in error quite often. Amazingly, looking at the context of a specific verse has a tendency to shed so much light on its meaning. Unfortunately, it would take a really long time to go through all the verses that I’ve come across that have been taken out of context and then dive into detail on what I’ve learned from those passages. And when I use the word “unfortunately”, I don’t mean that it’s unfortunate that I don’t have enough time to dive into each passage (although, that is true at this point). Rather, I mean it’s unfortunate that there are so many that have often been taught out of context.
Before you start getting all defensive and yelling, “Who do you think you are? How do you know you have the right interpretation instead of a bunch of pastors?”…let me say a couple things. First, I have so much to learn and do not even pretend to claim that I “know it all”. Therefore, I highly value the teaching of those who have been studying God’s Word for years. In fact, when I memorize Scripture, I spend hours listening to sermons given by servants of God who highly value teaching the truth of God’s Word without apology. Sometimes I wrestle with some of what I hear in those sermons, often because the teaching is either not fun to hear or is contrary to what I had been taught for a long time. I want to seek and know and walk according to the Truth. So when I listen to sermons, it’s not for the purpose of learning what James MacDonald or John Piper or John MacArthur might think about various topics. I am more concerned about learning God’s Word…just as these men of God are more concerned about preaching the truth of God’s Word than they are about sharing their thoughts about various issues. Second, as I study God’s Word, I’m also seeking to learn it in context. Quite often, the context makes the meaning of the verse glaringly obvious. The surrounding verses make that specific verse’s meaning very clear. And other times, even if the meaning isn’t clear at first, the context indicates an error in a common teaching of that specific verse.
My plan is to do a series on various passages that fit into the category I’ve just talked about. Since life can tend to be rather busy, it’s sometimes a challenge to find the time to blog. I’m thinking that if I focus on one specific passage per blog post, I’ll be more likely to keep up with it.
Here are some of the passages you will hopefully see blog posts on soon:
Hebrews 4:12
1 John 3:20
Jeremiah 29:11
Lamentations 3:22-23
Romans 8
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