Deciphering

[for_his_glory]

How can we decipher what is Spiritual or literal when we are studying the Bible? Doesn’t everyone have their own opinions when it comes to studying and can we trust those opinions? Can Gods word be Spiritual and literal at the same time? Only the Holy Spirit can answer these questions when we ask for wisdom and understanding because God is not the author of confusion and wants to reveal all the hidden mysteries of his word to us.

God is Spirit and much of his written word is also Spiritual as much as it is literal. Like man is human in the flesh, but Spiritual through the rebirth or renewal in Gods Holy Spirit. I believe the Bible is more Spiritual than literal in many ways as when we read a chapter at a time we can have many different points of views on it, but if we take each chapter and read it verse by verse then as a whole it brings life to the whole chapter and reveals the importance of the knowledge God wants us to learn and share with others.

The story of Jesus first miracle of turning water into wine is an excellent example of both being a literal and Spiritual teaching as you will see as you study the scriptures and allow the Holy Spirit minister this wonderful event in your life as well as it was revealed to the Disciples being with Jesus on that day of the wedding. When you look for the Spiritual in all of scripture so many new revelations in the word will be revealed to you that you have never seen before and it will be hard to even try and contain your exuberance of the wisdom and understanding you will gain.

 

[reba]

YUP :yes

 

[Karl]

Precisely.....,

But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1Co 2:14

That's what I like about Christian forums, in searching for how to answer a thread I learn, the Holy Spirit is teaching me, often it goes way beyond the answer I'm seeking, the Dinosaur thread is an example, He was revealing Truth, tying loose ends together, so that I was no longer interested in responding, and continued on in learning from the Master. PTL

Blessing

 

[for_his_glory]

Yes Karl, we are ever learning when we do not lean on our own understanding or of what someone else tries to teach us apart from the Holy Spirit. Sometimes it takes me a long time to reply to certain topics as I get to digging even deeper as the Holy Spirit goes above that of what I was even looking for.

 

[Karl]

And that is the major problem with Christian Forums and what causes all of the debates and arguments,there are the different stages of Christian development: babies, children young people and adults, all trying to talk at the same time, imagine an adult trying to hold a conversation with a baby or child, babes and children talk, whereas adults have experience, not judging or being critical here, just stating an observation.

Blessings

 

[for_his_glory]

This is why we need patience and tolerance with each other and never condemn or belittle one another as all of us are ever learning.

 

[Willie T]

I'm curious..... why would we think we are supposed to study the Bible in divided-up segments (chapters and verses), when the original texts were written as units that were penned as all-inclusive writings, to stand together as one presentation?

The Bible wasn't divided into chapters until around 1227.... and it wasn't until more than 300 years later, 1551. that it was further divided into verses. And, in truth, much of that dividing has caused a large degree of misunderstanding of the original intent because of people zeroing-in on selected verses taken totally out of context.

CHECK OUT THIS BIBLE

 

[Karl]

Now I'm curious, how do you suggest we study it? It's clear the Books of the Bible are Divine points of division, or maybe it's better said, subjects.

For me it's like this:

For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little: Isa 28:10

I try and read through my Bible every year, in doing that the Holy Spirit teaches me and in so doing connects the dots, here a little and there a little, ...building on the Divine precepts.

I have come to learn the Bible comes to us from outside of our space-time domain (no human could have been the Author) and it is a wonderful love story, actually penned by a extra-terrestrial, and we have the privileged of becoming acquainted with Him through it, the more we study, the more we learn of His unlimited love for us, ......even to the point of taking on the form of a Man and allowing us to crucify Him on a Cross.

Blessings

 

[for_his_glory]

Willie, I am saying that if you do not read the whole and only use a small portion of the whole it can become twisted and taken out of the context of the whole. Yes, our Bibles are with book, chapter and verse which makes it easier for us to make note and go back to refer to a certain section, but if we do not take the whole section and compare scripture with scripture, OT with NT then we can only speculate and never come to truth as the Holy Spirit wants revealed to us.

 

[jasonc]

the name ot and nt are from a heretic and yet that is another division that separated the Jewishness found in the bible from the church.

 

[Willie T]

I found it especially interesting that some of the books were originally combined, but we don't have them that way in our English Bibles. And I was blown away to see that our Bibles merely group Paul's letters in range from longest to shortest, giving no thought to the chronological order in which they were written. And there are other interesting things..........

But, I suspect that few people here read much of that stuff. Am I right?

 

[jasonc]

I found it especially interesting that some of the books were originally combined, but we don't have them that way in our English Bibles. And I was blown away to see that our Bibles merely group Paul's letters in range from longest to shortest, giving no thought to the chronological order in which they were written. And there are other interesting things..........

But, I suspect that few people here read much of that stuff. Am I right?

somewhat, mattthew was first. and look at how the tanach is set up with the books of the kings,samuel and chronicles

 

[Karl]

But, I suspect that few people here read much of that stuff. Am I right?

Yes I'm aware of those things, but how does the placement of the Books, the grouping together, or the chronological order hinder the Holy Spirit from teaching me?

 

[Jethro Bodine]

I was blown away to see that our Bibles merely group Paul's letters in range from longest to shortest, giving no thought to the chronological order in which they were written.

I heard that the books of the Bible on the end are there because they resist OSAS too easily. I'm being serious.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

the name ot and nt are from a heretic and yet that is another division that separated the Jewishness found in the bible from the church.

Perhaps the division between covenants should actually be between John and Acts? But I suppose it's the 400 year silence between the prophets and the gospels that suggests the appropriate division in time.

 

[jasonc]

Perhaps the division between covenants should actually be between John and Acts? But I suppose it's the 400 year silence between the prophets and the gospels that suggests the appropriate division in time.

are you a futurist? some form of those do say. how about brit chadosh and tanach? the former means new covenant in Hebrew.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

are you a futurist?

As long as it's not something perverse I suppose I am.

...chadosh...

gesundheit

 

[jasonc]

As long as it's not something perverse I suppose I am.



gesundheit

most perverse, they believe some out there stuff.lol

 

[Jethro Bodine]

How can we decipher what is Spiritual or literal when we are studying the Bible? Doesn’t everyone have their own opinions when it comes to studying and can we trust those opinions? Can Gods word be Spiritual and literal at the same time? Only the Holy Spirit can answer these questions when we ask for wisdom and understanding because God is not the author of confusion and wants to reveal all the hidden mysteries of his word to us.

God is Spirit and much of his written word is also Spiritual as much as it is literal. Like man is human in the flesh, but Spiritual through the rebirth or renewal in Gods Holy Spirit. I believe the Bible is more Spiritual than literal in many ways as when we read a chapter at a time we can have many different points of views on it, but if we take each chapter and read it verse by verse then as a whole it brings life to the whole chapter and reveals the importance of the knowledge God wants us to learn and share with others.

The story of Jesus first miracle of turning water into wine is an excellent example of both being a literal and Spiritual teaching as you will see as you study the scriptures and allow the Holy Spirit minister this wonderful event in your life as well as it was revealed to the Disciples being with Jesus on that day of the wedding. When you look for the Spiritual in all of scripture so many new revelations in the word will be revealed to you that you have never seen before and it will be hard to even try and contain your exuberance of the wisdom and understanding you will gain.

I have found that the Bible is it's own best interpreter. If you don't understand a particular passage of scripture, sooner or later the Holy Spirit will pull all the different pieces of scripture related to that passage together to bring you the understanding you seek. Almost with out fail, doctrines that are false have left some piece of scripture out that prevents that doctrine from being true.

 

[Christ_empowered]

I'm taking a class at Liberty kinda sorta on this. Actually, 2 of them. They're 100 level, so its not super advanced or anything, but...

...in 1 class, the current reading emphasizes historical-culture context. Not that you disregard Scripture after over-analyzing content, but that you take the time to put verses into context before applying them literally or getting scared of them because (like women not prophesying with head coverings and such).

In the other class, them emphasis is on the whole of Christian Thought (its...get read for this...Intro to Christian Thought), which includes a good bit of Bible Study. Just as Willie T wrote about not picking out verses, the idea here is to take the whole Bible and build a Biblical Worldview. Of course, this class focuses on your own Biblical Worldview, but I think its increasingly important to try to get whole groups of Christians to build a Biblical Worldview.