So soon I will be moving to a new apartment across town so it is time to pack and clean. It takes me awhile to pack and clean because I play with things that I have not touched in a long time. You start putting stuff in a box and all of a sudden it looks so appealing again. The question is when was the last time you picked up the Bible and spent time with God? Sometimes our personal life with God is like when I pack. We plan on spending time with God everyday but then stuff gets in the way, and you know what it is in your life. Then when we go to church, camp, a mission trip, a retreat or anything where we see how cool God is. This is when we "play" with the item we had stored for awhile. We pick the Bible up again and spend time with God, but then we find ourselves putting it back down and don't see it again till we go to that place that motivated us to pick it up. Why does this happen?
A few observations that I have. The first is that we are reading the Bible wrong. Sometimes people have a check list or want to read a chapter a day. Good in thought, but eventually you make spending time with God a task instead of a hang out time with God. Then when you miss one or two days you hate yourself and get fed up with reading the Bible. We are too meditate on what the Bible is saying and really apply it to our lives. Take time after reading the Bible, however much you read, and ask God, "How do I apply this to my life?" Let God show you and take time to listen instead of just asking God a list of things you need.
Another observation comes from our selfish attitude, "There is nothing in it for me." or "It is boring!" Again you are reading the Bible wrong. When we become a Christian we are made in a new creation and strive to be more like Christ. We cannot know how to do that without reading the Bible and spending time with God. Read the Bible with a mindset of how can I apply this to my life? or what is God teaching me through this? Take time to really reflect on it during the day. This is how you develop more into Christ and really get everything out of the Bible.
The last observation is that people read one verse and make it mean whatever they want it to mean. Again you are reading the Bible wrong...haha do you see a pattern. The problem with some people is that they read one verse or have a devotional that takes one verse and make it mean anything they want. They don't take the time to get the context of the whole passage or study it more. That can be a problem and is reasons why we get a lot of random crazy theologies. So make sure you take time to really get the context of the whole passage. You do not have to read a commentary to know it, but that is one of the best places. I tend to read the chapter before and after the passage I hear in church. biblestudytools.com is a good site to use if you really want to dig into the context and the history of the passage.
So now that I basically told you that you read the Bible wrong let me give some tools that helped me get the most out of my Bible reading and spending time with God. There is a reading plan called Time With ABBA. Read the passage but underline or write out verses. (I write out all of it to keep the context...the kings of Israel would write a copy of the whole law when they became king). Then you underline/highlight in different colors characteristics of God, sins that you see, and promises/things God does for us. Then once that is done you pray by praising God who he is based on what you saw in the Bible, then you ask forgiveness either from you, your town, your church, your nation...etc the sins you saw in the Bible, and then you claim/ask God to bless you with the promises or the things God does for us. This works well for me because when I go through the day I notice more what I read in the Bible and I learn more about who God is.
Another tool that I have used in the past is REAPing. (Read, Examine, Apply and Prayer). Read the passage first. Then you examine, which is looking at the passage and understanding what it is saying. This can be down by writing in your own words, studying the context using different tools or asking other Christians to help you understand it. Then you take what you learn and apply it to your life. Then you write a prayer to ask God to help you with what you learned and trying to apply to your life.
There you go...when you do this then you will see God work in your life and transform you to be more like Christ. But remember to take time to listen to God instead of doing all the talking.
No comments:
Post a Comment