Lesson 2: Starting with the Bible
Taking the First Step of Bible Study
Now that we’ve established the importance of the first step of Bible study, let’s probe two practical guidelines for success. The first is a denial, and the second is a duty.
Don’t Think You Can Start with a Blank Slate
You cannot read the Bible without pre-existing ideas. There are four reasons for this.
Each Christian has been unavoidably shaped by various elements of the world.
We live in a secular society. We breathe its air and absorb its beliefs and values, whether consciously or not, and bring them to the text of Scripture. We have also been shaped by our personal history, our varied experiences, our ethnic background, and many other factors. We need to be aware of possible personal biases and blind spots as we seek to understand God’s Word.
But there are also various natural elements of the world around that shape us and enable us to understand the Bible. For example, since you have been hungry and thirsty, you are prepared to understand the comparison of Jesus to food and drink. If you have a loving father, you are prepared to understand what the Bible means by calling God your Father.
Each Christian, except the newest, already has biblical knowledge.
We have heard many sermons. We have read parts of the Bible before. We have read books about the Bible and theological topics. Therefore, each of us has mental furniture arranged in a certain way, hopefully much of it biblical.
Each Christian inherits the theological musings and wrestlings of past generations.
Presbyterians, Baptists, Anglicans, and Pentecostals, to name just a few traditions, stand in a long line of theologians who have established creeds, confessional standards, and theological boundaries. We cannot and should not jettison them as we approach the Bible, even as we seek to submit them all to the authority of the text.
Each Christian is indwelt by the Holy Spirit.
To become a Christian at all, one must confess that Jesus is Lord (Rom 10:9, 13). The Holy Spirit enables this confession (1 Cor 12:3). It is the Spirit (“the anointing” in 1 John 2:27) who teaches the believer all truth, who convinces people of the lordship and deity of Christ, of the sinfulness of man, of the inerrancy of Scripture, of salvation by grace through faith. All who are indwelt by the Spirit already know these first principles and should keep them in mind when reading.
If we know we come to Scripture with preconceived notions, we will be able to avoid those that are unbiblical and embrace those that are biblical as we interpret the text.
Do Choose a Helpful Bible Study Method
There are many methods out there for studying the Bible, some better and some worse. Here at Biblearc, we teach two basic approaches to Bible study.
Two basic approaches
The first is called Arcing or Bracketing. It focuses on verbal ideas, called propositions, and their logical relationship to each other.
The difference between Arcing and Bracketing is their visual representation (curved arcs for the former and right-angled brackets for the latter).
Each visual representation has its own strength: Arcing most clearly shows how groups of propositions relate to each other, while Bracketing more clearly displays the main point of the passage via the longest horizontal line.
The second approach is called Phrasing. It focuses on groups of words that form a conceptual unit, called phrases, and their grammatical relationship to each other.
It zooms in one level further than Arcing and Bracketing.
The phrases furthest to the left contain the grammatical emphasis of the sentence, while the other phrases are indented in levels of subordination.
The logical focus of the first and the precise nature of the second complement each other well.
Biblearc offers Arcing, Bracketing, and Phrasing courses to teach you these methods, including coaching to push you along and rewards to encourage you to finish.
The original languages
The way to study the Scriptures with the greatest precision is to learn the original languages. So we offer courses in the two primary biblical languages, with the aim of magnifying Jesus through better understanding of the OT and NT and enabling students to carry out the first step of Bible study with the greatest accuracy.
We designed our beginning Greek course to take students from no knowledge of Greek to an ability to read and translate all non-verb elements of Koine Greek as well as non-finite verbs.
Our approach to learning biblical Hebrew is unique, utilizing worship songs in Hebrew as the basis for learning. By immersing ourselves in Hebrew songs, absorbing vocabulary and studying grammar become joyful activities and not dreaded chores.
The assumption in this course
In the Treasury course, I assume that you are familiar with a tested Bible study method like Arcing, Bracketing, or Phrasing. If you don’t have a strong tool to study the Scriptures with, I encourage you to pause this course until you have at least started studying one of them. (If you’re unsure, talk to your coach.) It is important that you can take the first step of Bible study, however wobbly your legs, before you move on to the second step.