Why read the Bible after all?

You may ask, why read the Bible? Why studying it after all?  What is the profit? What is the point?

Well I could give you at least four good reasons, all from the Holy Scriptures, why ro read it.

Fisrt and foremost, because it is God's will. Second because it gives you faith. Third because it is profitable and fourth because it can make you perfect!

Let us see these reasons from the Bible. Use any translation or version you want, it does not change the truth of the Word.

• 2 Timothy 2:15 - It is the will of God

"Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth".

 What to study? The New York Times? your college work? google results? NO! Study the Bible.  Why? to be approved unto God, not to your pastor, your husband or wife, or your friends but to God himself. A workman that needs not to be ashamed. How would you like that? not to be ashamed towards God almighty, towards the creator of the heaven and earth. Well, there is a way to do it. Study the Scriptures. There no other single verse in the Bible to say that. How to show your self approved unto God.

Now what about the rightly dividing part?  Does it mean there is a wrongly dividing? You bet there is, otherwise there wouldn't be so many cults or denominations or dogmas among Christianity ot Judaism. I am not here to tell you who is wrongly doing it and who is rightly doing it but I can tell you this: YOU are supposed to rightly divide it for yourself. None will say to Christ at His judgement seat "Oh my pastor did not rightly divide it", every one will have to do it for him or her self. So you better start doing it.

Just for the scholars out there on the Web, as a Greek myself I cannot resist the temptation to tell you a bit about the word that is used in the Greek for "rightly dividing". It is one Greek word, the word ορθοτομούντα  (pronounced orthotomounda) and it is its only occurance in the Bible, used just in this verse. It is a compound word, it is made from two words the word ορθος (pronounced orthos) and τέμνω (pronounced temno). The first one just means right and the second one means cut or divide. So it means to cut right, to divide right, as the KJV translation does say.

I want to give you an example of that to understand what I say. When Jesus read the scroll of Isaih in the synagogue he stopped just in the middle of a verse. See the incident in Luke and read it with me.

Luke 4:17-20 

"And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written,

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,

To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him."

Now do you think that Jesus Christ did not rightly divided the Bible? He sure did! He closed the Book. Look at the passage he was quoting:

Isaiah 61:1-2

"The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound;

To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn;"

(the underline is mine to see the part He skipped)

Do you understand? He cut the verse in the middle! After this comma is the second coming, then will the day of vengeance of our God will be, not in His first. Jesus Christ is the perfect example in everything, including rightly dividing the Word of truth. If He read more He  would not be right.

I hope you do understand the point.  That is why it is important to undrestand the times, the administrations and all the principles that govern how we study the Bible.

I do suggest, at some point, that you do read all the quotations Jesus Christ used from the Old Testament. Especially the ones He used during His temptations, it is brilliant how He rightly divides the Word every time. It is a very good exercise for you to do, in order to see the principle in action, from the best Teacher, the Lord Himself.

• Romans 10:17 - It gives you Faith
  

"So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.".

So you want more faith? Hear the Word!, read it, study it. The word of God is living, it has the power to build faith in you.

• 2 Timothy 3:16 - it is profitable

"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:"

Here apart  from a pretty good reason why to study the Bible, it is profitable, we also have the origin of the Scriptures. They are given by inspiration of God. This is a huge topic on its own, but suffice to say that they originate from Him. Not from the church fathers, the prophets or even the apostles but from God the Father Himself. Another verse illustrates the same point. 

2 Peter 1:20-21

"Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.

For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost".

You have to understand something here, " Moved by the holy Ghost" and "by inspiration of God"  mean the same thing.

The word inspired by God is again one compound Greek word Θεόπνευστος (pronounced theopnefstos) and it comes from two words. The word Θεος (pronounced theos), meaning God and πνευστος (pronounced pnefstos) and meaning breath or wind  (like in wind instruments). So the word literally means God-breathed. Inspiration  in English also comes from in and the Latin spirare wich means breathe also. 

The Bible has many writers but only ONE author, God.

Moses did not sit under a tree in the dessert and said: "Hmmm, oh, I think I am in the mood to write Genesis", neither Paul eating his breakfast in a prison in Rome said: " Well the time is right to write a letter to my pal Titus", not Jeremiah while in the pit of shit said " I bet now its the time to write lamentations", NO, none of them did it this way. God moved them, God told them when and what to write, God inspired all that they wrote to the very last word. BUT you must remember something:

All that is said or done in the Bible is not inspired by God BUT the fact that they are written is inspired by God.

The fact that in Psalm 53:1a says "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God." does not say that God inspired the fool to say it, the fact that it is writtern in the Bible, that the fool said such a thing, is what is inspired by God.

Now what is it profitable for? 4 things. You may want to check the prepositions article for the word προς that is used here. It means towards to, with an aim to.

• doctrine -  διδασκαλιαν (pronounced didaskalian)

 Doctrine or teaching is nothing more than WHAT to believe

• reproof - ελεγχον (pronounced elenhon)

 Reproof is a misunderstood word. People use it to yell, to tell you what is wrong, to tell you you either sin or you are a sinner and is widely abused. Some through a verse in your face and tell you to accept reproof. They use it to condemn and reproach, but is is not so with God.

I will give you a few examples from the Greek to understand what God means here. We have an ελενχο  in a company when the IRS comes for audit. Children get an ελενχο when they get their report from school. I get an ελενχο when I look myself in the mirror to check how do I look.

And that is what reproof is all about! Even in English it comes from re (the opposite of) and proof, thus seeing how you are doing, if you can proove your standing, in what condition you are in. You read a verse and you check for yourself, the Word on its own proves if you are doing it or not, thus reproofing you. It is like a mirror that checks you. How is your walk with God, how is your sin life, how you are doing generally. It does not accuse you, it just gives you a mark, a standard to compare your self, it audits you. You do not need help to do that from an external source that will condemn you, the Devil is the accuser of our brethren and we better not help him in his work. If we feel we, ourselves or anyone else needs reproof, just read the Word, to yourself or to them, that will do the work, because it is one of the things the Bible is profitable for.

• correction - επανορθωσιν (pronounced epanorthosi)
  

This is a compound word again, meaning standing up again. Being right again. And that is why God never stops at reproof and neither should we. There is no point on telling anyone where they are wrong, what they do wrong if you do not tell them what to do right. Fault finding, sin pointing, and error discovery are pretty easy for all, it is basic human flesh nature. There is no difficulty on doing that, the difficult part is to tell to the person, including ourself, what to do right to come back on track. And the Word of God does exactly that. It does not say "You should not steal" only, it says "work" to fulfil your needs and other's too.

• instruction into righteousness - παιδειαν την εν δικαιοσυνη (pronounced pedian tin en dikeosini)

Those previous three make up a total instruction into righteousness. The word used for instruction, Παιδεία means education and much more than simply that. It covers all the aspects of life. It is the education and training of whole life style to become a complete person. A person instructed into righteousness. And that bring us to the next profit:

•  2 Timothy 3:17 - It perfects you

"That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works "

αρτιος (pronounced artios), the Greek word used for perfect means complete, whole, full. The verse says that by gaining the profit from the Word of truth we become complete persons, fully equipped to do good works. These are not good works in order to be saved but good works because we are.

The Bible makes us good people, good human beings, good Christians, able to do good, because we can not do it on our own. His Word provides the means.

The list of the profits of reading the Bible, of studying the Holy Scriptures is endless. Here I listed just four, read Psalm 119 to see many more.

The more you read it the more you will answer on your own "Why should I study the Bible?"  Do it and you will see.