Why Read Commentaries and Christian Living Books?

EP 29 | Why Read Commentaries and Christian Living Books?

 

https://www.amazon.com/Grasping-Gods-Word-Fourth-Hands/dp/0310109175/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1702912940&sr=8-1

 

The gap in our understanding of the Bible isn’t because the Bible is unclear, but because we are cultural outsiders.

 

There is book called Grasping Scripture by Scott J Duvall and Daniel J Hayes, all about crossing the bridge from our town to theirs to understand what is in the Bible.

 

Time, distance, and language make it harder to understand the cultures that the Bible talks about. Also, the way they wrote is also different than they way we write and think.

 

For example, we don’t care about genealogies because they are full of names that we don’t care about, but the ancient reader would go nuts as they rediscover their family history. We care about the exact timing of events when the biblical authors care more about the right timing or season of the event. Some events are rearranged to emphasize a theological point over the story. Gospels are thought of as biographies when they are really gospels - accounts of an important person highlighting some key accomplishes and then how they died.

 

My point is that you need commentaries and books from faithful Bible teachers that have devoted their lives to studying the Bible, the original languages, the archeology, and the culture. Catholic and Evangelical scholars are the best people to learn the Bible from because they are the ones that take it the most seriously.

 

Compare that with the average content creator who hasn’t earned the qualification or spent the time to really grasp what the Bible says. You can have an opinion, just remember that not all opinions are equal. Most of you have uneducated, uninformed opinions, and then you post your ignorance online. My opinion is that you shouldn’t have the internet!

 

Why Christian living books? They help us apply what we have read in the Bible. Sometimes specific topics require more attention based on the amount of commands or principles in the Bible concerning it, like marriage or money. Not everything written in them is true. Quite frankly, there’s a lot of garbage, like the old book, the Shack. Resources created by Christians who love Jesus and have devoted their lives to obeying Jesus have many things to teach us.

 

The best thing you can do is to visit many books but live in the Bible. Keep a humble attitude as you’re reading it. Two ditches lay on either side of the road to understanding - one is assuming that the Bible is a myth and cannot be understood. The other ditch is assuming you know everything. Both are wrong. Acknowledge how far you’ve come to understand the Bible and keep learning.

 

See you next time.