30 minute read

How to Study the Bible

By Lance Lambert

Well, now, this evening we come to this last study in this series which we have entitled "How to Study the Bible."

We've now looked at many aspects of the Bible. We have looked at the matter of authority, of inspiration, of revelation. We have looked at the aim and the scope of the Bible, its structure and its growth, the text and its transmission over the centuries. And we have dealt with the history of the English versions of the Bible.

Now it remains for us to consider the way we should approach personal Bible reading and study of God's word.

There's been an awful lot in these studies that have of necessity been technical, but we must this evening point out that in every way God's word can meet us. There is, in fact, no part of God's word which God cannot use at some time or another to really meet us in our need.

What God Calls His Word

It is interesting, for instance, to discover what God calls His word.

A Seed

He calls it, in Matthew 13:19 and onwards, a seed. It is a seed which is sown in us and will grow. It will convert us and then it will grow and it will bear fruit. Much fruit, in fact.

Milk and Solid Food

And then in 1 Peter 2:2, we're told it is milk. When we are very young and we can't take solid food, then God's word is milk to us.

So you must never think that once God has sown His word in your heart and it's taken root and it's beginning to grow and you're a true child of God, that there's not something in God's word for you. However simple your outlook, however young you are as a Christian, well, then you see, there's something for you. God's word is called milk. We are told to desire it as newborn babes.

And then we are told in Hebrews 5:14 that when we are a little older, it's solid food. When we've got beyond the milk stage, we still need milk. But when we're beyond just milk, then there's solid food in the Bible. And we're told that solid food is for those who are full grown, it says.

A Lamp

Then again in Psalm 119:105, we are told that God's word is a lamp to lighten our path, to guide us.

Do we need guidance? Do we need to know something of a situation we're in? Do we need to understand God's will for our lives? Do we need to understand God's purpose in its most general and greatest lines? Well, God's word is a lamp.

Not only will it give us personal light and show us the way. Not only will it lead us, as it were, into all truth, but it will show us on a much greater scale if we would know what is the purpose of God from eternity to eternity.

A Mirror

And in James 1:23, we read that the Bible is a mirror in which we can see ourselves.

There's a very great need for us to see ourselves, to see whether we're growing in the Lord, to see what's ugly, to see what's untidy, to see what needs cleaning up, to see just what we're like.

And God's word is a mirror. And if we're honest when we come to God's word, then we shall see things as they really are. We shall see a reflection of things in God's word. It will tell us the truth about ourselves. We shall see a reflection. It's no good saying that reflection is someone else. That reflection is me. I'm looking into it.

A Fire

And then in Jeremiah 23:29, God's word is called a fire. A fire that burns and purifies, burns up the dross and purifies what is true and valuable.

So God's word is like that. If you and I are honest and if we want to go on with the Lord, then God's word will be a fire in our bones. And it will burn up what is dross if we allow the Lord to have His way. And it will purify what is of Himself. "Thy word," it says in one of the Psalms, "O Lord is tried," and it's tried by fire.

A Hammer

And then again in the same verse, Jeremiah 23:29, we're told that God's word is a hammer and it breaks what has got to be broken.

If there's something in you which has got to be broken, you can be quite sure that God's word will break it in the end. God's word is a hammer.

And sometimes we don't like certain parts of God's word. There are some people who only read certain portions of God's word because they know those are the comforting portions. I always feel a little fearful about promise boxes in that direction, for you cannot fail to get some comforting promise from a promise box.

But you see, God's word at times is a hammer. And you know it is for our own well-being that part of our nature gets broken. If there's something in us that needs breaking, then thank God, God's word will break it. It's a hammer in the hands of the Holy Spirit.

A Laver

And then again in Ephesians 5:26, we are told that God's word is a laver, a washing bowl, a washing place, and there we can be washed continually and we can be kept clean. Jesus said:

And the psalmist said:

God's word is a laver. And every time we read God's word, it cleanses our minds.

Now, are you troubled by evil thoughts? Read God's word, you'll find it has a cleansing effect upon your mind. Are you bothered about other things? You feel dirty? Read God's word, you will find it cleanses you. Somehow it purifies the atmosphere. It purifies the mind.

Well, God's word is a laver, and the priests had to continually come back to the laver to wash in it. And so you and I have got to continually come back to God's word that we may be washed, we may receive that washing by the word.

A Sword

And then, of course, in Ephesians 6:17, God's word is a sword. And in Hebrews 4:12, it is a sword that does something in us. It's a sword that divides soul from spirit.

Now, that's really almost a surgeon's knife. God's word can be like that. It's not a blunt instrument, it's not an instrument that hacks its way into you. It is just like a surgeon's knife. God knows exactly what He's doing. And by His word He can sever things. He can just get in on the inside and He can say, "that's Christ and that's you."

He can discern the thoughts and the intents of the heart by His word. "Search me, O God, and try me and see whether there be any wicked way in me." God does it that way.

But also God's word is a sword to be held in our hand for defence and for victory. In Ephesians 6:17, we're told that it is "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." Get it into your hand and you'll be able to withstand the devil in the day when he comes. When the evil one comes, you've got God's word in you and you can deal with evil and you can defend yourself by the word of God. And not only defend yourself, you can overcome the evil one by the word of God.

Now all these things, this is what God's word is. We've been talking about a lot of the technicalities of God's word, the structure of the Bible, the growth of the Bible, the text of the Bible. But you know, this is the thing that's most important. This is the way God uses His word with us and to us.

Principles for Bible Study

So I want us in the light of all that this evening to consider for a little while how we should personally read and study the Bible.

Don't Substitute Books About the Bible for the Bible Itself

Now the first thing I would like to underline is the need to be careful not to substitute books on or about the Bible for the Bible itself.

You know, it's an amazing fact that all of us have a tendency to more easily read books on the Bible than the Bible. For instance, do you know, I know some people who take Scripture Union notes and other notes and I found in some cases they read the notes and don't read the Bible. An amazing fact.

But we must be very, very careful not to substitute books on or about the Bible for the Bible itself. You can read a commentary for instance, and really you're virtually reading the commentary and not the text. You can read a quite helpful book, an exposition, shall we say, on some chapter of the Bible. But in fact you're not reading God's word itself, it's comment upon God's word.

Now this is very important. This is a danger we can all fall easily into. Reading and studying books in place of the Bible.

Now such books, I suppose it hardly needs to be said, have got their place. They are legitimate and they're valuable. But if they are substituted for the Bible itself, if the reading of them is substituted for reading of the Bible itself, then they become positively dangerous, positively dangerous. Because a good and legitimate thing has become the means of keeping you away from original contact with God's word.

You are reading God's word in a second-hand way. Instead of getting right through to God's word itself and letting the Holy Spirit use God's word in your heart and life, you are in fact taking something that it has meant to someone else.

Now that has its place. I'm not going to stop this evening and talk about the place that exposition and commentaries and Bible notes and much else have. I'm just pointing out that it can be positively dangerous if we read those things in place of the Bible. The thing to remember and do is to read and study God's word itself above all else.

Overcome Aversion and Make Time

It's a strange thing that we often find almost an aversion within ourselves to reading God's word. We have a natural—a natural, should I say traitor within us.

And often there is an aversion within us, which we may not have even recognised, to reading God's word. Do you know we can spend hours reading the newspapers, we can spend hours reading a novel, we can spend hours reading books. But when it comes to reading God's word then there's a strange aversion to it. We have difficulty over it, we just don't want to. Or we say we find it hard going.

Isn't it strange? We don't find it about other things, but when it comes to God's word we find it.

Now this is very strange in many ways. I think that we've got to take very real note because Bible study can become not only vital and valuable and instructive for us, but it can become enthralling. I don't know why people should think Bible study is always tedious, why they should always feel that it's some terrible duty through which they have got to plod.

Do you know Bible study can become absolutely enthralling? I'm not saying that it'll always be exciting or enthralling. There are times when we have got to plod. There are a lot of reasons for that. Sometimes we get out on the wrong side of the bed some mornings and whatever we do somehow or other is wrong.

But what I am saying is this, that Bible study need not only be valuable and instructive and necessary, but it can be enthralling if it is approached in the right way. Now this is the point of this study this evening. It's what we're going to talk about.

I mean if every single morning you're given awful lumpy porridge that hasn't got enough salt in it and also then after that you have a terribly hard-boiled egg and tea that looks like dishwater. And every single morning you get that, well, I don't wonder that you long for a continental breakfast, one little roll and a nice cup of coffee.

Because you don't relish your breakfasts, you don't look forward to them. A little bit of variety, a little bit of better cooking, a little bit more care and your breakfasts will come to be something to you that you'll look forward to. Not only necessary, not only important, but they will also be something you look forward to.

It's exactly the same with Bible study, and I'm not being irreverent. If a little more time is taken over it, a little more care, a little more preparation, a little more variety in the way that you approach it, and your Bible study, your Bible reading will not only be vital, but it will also become enthralling.

The first things therefore to remember are two things.

We must read God's word itself. Now get that in your head. I know it's terribly simple, but we must read God's word itself. That's the first thing. And the second thing is determination is needed to ignore feelings and make time.

Now, I found this, that this aversion that often you've got inside of you. Once it's ignored and you make time, you're enthralled. And often those are the times the Lord meets you most especially. It's just as if in the unseen that evil one knew there's a blessing for you that morning and so he's trying to put you off.

Determination's needed. Don't just think it's the old man. Some people seem to think any determination belongs to the old man. It's the flesh-life. No, there can be a determination of the right kind. You must fight the good fight of faith and lay hold on life eternal. Determination is needed to ignore these feelings. You're not going to have anything to do with these feelings. You've got to feed.

Supposing day after day you refused to eat because you didn't feel like it? You'd starve to death in the end.

You've got to pull yourself together and eat. So you've got to do the same spiritually. The devil knows only too well he'll inject some kind of drug into you spiritually, that'll just take away—you know, these Purple Hearts, you know what they do? They take away your appetite.

That's what the devil sometimes does with some people. He gives a spiritual Purple Heart. And after a while they lose their appetite for God's word, you see, and they think they're all right, but gradually they're collapsing. And we can all see it. The backbone's going. There's a dullness in the eye, there's a pallor in the face. They're going down slowly because they've lost their appetite for God's word.

All they've got to do is pull themselves together and say it's necessary for me to have a daily meal spiritually and that needs determination to ignore my feelings and to make time.

Someone said you'll never have time for reading God's word or for prayer until you make it. It's very true. If you wait for some little opportunity during the day, you'll discover that a whole week has gone by and you've got no opportunity. The opportunity has to be made. Time has to be made.

Taking Bible Reading and Study Seriously

The second thing is, the second large thing I'd like to say is the need to take Bible reading and study seriously. It's no good taking it sort of in a light-hearted, frivolous way.

Why don't you get a lot out of your Bible reading? Because you're not taking it seriously, that's why.

You fall out of bed, you put a comb through your hair, you sort of look rather bleary-eyed at the mirror and then you start to brush and clean yourself up and then you have your breakfast or I don't know if it's before breakfast or after breakfast. And then three minutes between then and catching the bus, you race through the Daily Light.

Not even the word of God, often it's The Daily Light—Mr. Redpath called it the lazy man's Bible. You race through it and you're off and then you say, "I don't know, I've lost my appetite for spiritual things."

Well of course you've lost your appetite for spiritual things. You'll never get anywhere until you take Bible study seriously.

Do you really think that God is going to take you seriously if you don't take Him seriously? Do you really think that the Lord Jesus—who said "don't cast pearls before swine"—is going to open up the treasures of His word? When you are just sort of somehow crawling around the place and you're going to devote just a rushed minute in which you're thinking all the time about getting away and your mind's on other things.

You think the Lord's going to open up the treasures of His word? No, no, not at all. Not at all.

Four Biblical Requirements for Serious Bible Study

Now there are four things in God's word that show us how we must seriously treat the reading and study of His word.

1. Examine

First in Acts 17:11:

Now your Authorised Version has "searching the Scriptures daily." And in fact the word means investigate. These people examined or investigated the Scriptures daily.

Now, that's the first thing you must—if you're going to take the Bible, if you're going to take Bible study seriously, the first word to remember is examine or search or investigate.

I looked it up in Vine's Dictionary and I found a very interesting thing. This word means to examine by torture. It was used, for instance, when Pilate spoke of the Lord Jesus. "I have examined him," he said, "and find no fault in him." The word is to examine very carefully under torture. It was used in that connection anyway.

Now, you see, this is the kind of word that God uses for Bible study. It's not to be confined to a rushed few moments. You've got to examine carefully. You've got to investigate the word of God.

Now, that's very important. It is to be thoroughly investigated, to be searched out. It is like a mine of precious things. Now, in a mine, men have got to go right down into the darkness and they've got to work hard to get those precious things out of the mine. And God's word is like a mine. It yields to hard work, real examination and investigation.

2. Meditate

The second word, Joshua 1:8:

And then Psalm 1:2:

Meditate. We need to give time to reflection.

It's very interesting. This Hebrew word means to mutter. To meditate or to mutter. The idea is of someone who is so lost in meditation that they're muttering to themselves. They're turning it over in their heart, and they're lost in thought. That's the word, lost in thought.

Now listen. Do you take the study and reading of God's word so seriously that you meditate in these days in which we live, in which meditation is a lost art? Reflection. Do you reflect upon what you read? Do you meditate?

You see, God's word is food. It must be digested. It must be digested.

And so you must not only read God's word, but you must think upon it. You must be lost in thought upon it. You must reflect upon it.

3. Compare Scripture with Scripture

Then again, another word. Now, this isn't so easy. In 1 Corinthians 2:13, last part of the verse:

That's the Authorised Version and the Revised Version—it's not a very easy sentence to translate. You'll find all the versions differ and all of them have marginal alternatives. But the word really that I want just to remind you of here is to compare.

You see, we need to compare Scripture with Scripture all the time, remembering that the Bible is an unfolding revelation.

Now turn over to 2 Peter 1:20:

In other words, no Scripture can be uniquely interpreted. It cannot be interpreted on its own. Every Scripture must be seen in the perspective of the rest of Scripture. In other words, learn how to compare Scripture with Scripture. Learn how to do it.

Turn again to 2 Timothy 2:15:

Now the word originally here was rightly dividing, cutting or dividing. And then it came to mean dealing rightly. Now we must learn how to deal rightly with God's word. Only the Lord knows how terribly sometimes His word is treated, how people tear it out of context, how they wrongly divide it. They don't compare Scripture with Scripture.

Now, if you're going to take Bible reading seriously, compare Scripture with Scripture. Learn to rightly divide or to handle aright the word of God.

4. Obey God's Word

And lastly, in taking Bible reading and study seriously, obey God's word. Let's read James 1:22:

And then in John 7:17, I'm going to read this in the Revised Standard Version, it says this:

If any man's will is to do the will of God. Now don't expect God's word to be opened up to you if you're not prepared to obey. It's a closed book.

Many people come to me and say, "The Bible doesn't speak to me as it should." Yes, the Bible will not speak to you if you're not prepared to obey. If any man's will is to do the will of God, he shall know of the teaching that it is from God.

If a person's will has not capitulated to the Lord Jesus Christ, and if you are not prepared to obey Him, then do not expect God's word to open up to you.

You see, taking God's word seriously means that you're not just looking upon it as something to be trifled with, something just to be played around with. A little bit of sort of intellectual study, a little bit of adding to the brain, as it were. No, God's word won't open up to that at all. You must learn to obey.

The Need for the Holy Spirit's Ministry

The third thing in studying and reading the Bible is the need continually of prayerful reliance upon the Holy Spirit.

The Bible is mere literature to the natural mind. It's a great mass of religious law, of story, some history and doctrine to the natural man. Its real meaning is hidden to such. Now it's true to say the Bible is a closed book to the natural man.

Biblical Foundation for Spiritual Dependence

Now let's just look at a scripture or two. 1 Corinthians 2:12:

Verse 14:

And then again in 2 Corinthians 3:14:

Now listen, my dear friends, there is a veil over the heart of the natural man. You can be even a converted person, but you can have a veil over the heart. The Bible is a closed book, an absolutely closed book, unless you really have been brought into an experience of the Spirit of God. It is the Spirit of God that really begins to lead us into all truth.

Now this is exactly what the Lord Jesus spoke of in John 16:13-14. He said:

And then again in John 14:26, the Lord Jesus said again:

And of course, in Ephesians 1:16-18, which we have so often quoted, Paul gets on his knees and he prays for the church at Ephesus. And he prays that there may be granted unto them a spirit of wisdom and revelation, the eyes of their hearts being enlightened, that they might know.

Now, when you think about it—why didn't Paul write to the church at Ephesus and say, "Now look here, here's my letter. I believe this letter is absolutely from God. Now all of you get down to studying it. Get down to studying. That's all you've got to do."

He didn't say that. What he said when he wrote this letter was, "Look, I'm getting on my knees and I'm praying that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, that you might know what I'm talking about."

In other words, you can have this letter to the Ephesians, you can have this whole book and somehow or other you can study it, you can get hold of its doctrine and its teaching and yet remain spiritually in the dark because the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ has not been granted to you. The eyes of your heart have not been enlightened that you might know.

Personal Testimony

So, my dear friends, you can't just approach this book like you'd approach Shakespeare or you might approach the Quran or you might approach something else, some of the great Chinese classics. You can't just approach it like that. You have got to approach this book in prayerful reliance upon the Holy Spirit.

Do you know I never read this book without praying first that the Holy Spirit will lead me. I was taught to do that when I was first saved. And I've done it all the way through my life that I can remember.

I remember that dear old lady who had quite an influence on me when I was younger, Auntie Dagmar. She used to say many times to me, "Don't ever open that book without asking the Holy Spirit to lead you."

And it got into my heart. And I can't read this book without asking the Holy Spirit to reveal it. I always tell the Holy Spirit, "Lord, you know I'm blind. I'm absolutely blind to this book. Please lead me into the truth."

And it has been my experience that the Holy Spirit has led me into the truth. The little that I know, I owe completely to the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Why did John the apostle in 1 John 2:22, say:

It doesn't mean to say that you don't need teachers—that are functions in the church, gifts in the church of teaching. But you see, you have within you the Holy Spirit who can reveal originally these things. You not only hear it on the platform, but inside it's being made real to you so it becomes original. You've not got a second-hand experience.

Now listen, whenever there is no real revelation or enlightenment of the heart by the Holy Spirit, all experience, all knowledge is second-hand. And when fascism or communism or whatever antichrist force finally comes, that kind of second-hand Christianity will be the first to go. It will shift overnight, be gone in a flash. People will not be prepared to lose everything for Christ's sake.

No, you see, the whole point is to have an originally inward knowledge of the Lord. How does that come? By you and I getting on our knees prayerfully telling the Holy Spirit, "I'm blind."

You know, there's a strange arrogance in us all. A strange pride in us all that stops us from doing it, as if we're giving something away when we get on our knees.

Well of course we are, really. When we get on our knees and tell the Lord that we're just saying, "Lord, in these matters I'm a simple fool and I need the Holy Spirit." And that's the kind of attitude really the Holy Spirit takes up. Once you say, "I'm a simple fool in things of God," the Holy Spirit will say, "Well, I'll start to educate you."

But if you think that you've got a brain and a mind and an intellect and all the rest of it, you'll get yourself into such a mess, you'll have it all up here and you'll be barren down here and you'll blame it on everyone else. Go around saying, "Oh, they're this, they're that, they're the other." And in fact it's you. You've got it all up here [in your head] and not here [in your heart].

Can't blame that on anyone else. Every one of us has had provision made for us by Christ that we might have an original experience of the Lord.

Never study the word of God without first praying for the Holy Spirit's gracious ministry of guidance, enlightenment and instruction.

The Need for Humility

Fourth thing in the way we study God's word is the need of humility in our approach to the Bible. You see, God doesn't have to open up His word to us. And if there's any trace of arrogance, He won't.

There has got to be humility. And this is really what it means when a person gets on their knees like a little child and asks the Lord by His Holy Spirit to lead them into all the truth. We must have humility when we approach God. That this is God's word. And it's hidden. The vast part of God's word is hidden.

"These things are hidden from the wise, but they're revealed to babes and sucklings." And we need to be very, very humble when we come to God's word.

A Lesson in Humility

When we come up against a problem where we don't understand, a difficulty in God's word in our reading, and after we've prayed about it, when we've asked the Lord, "Well, Lord, will you show me what this means?"—if the Lord doesn't show you what it means, be humble enough to let it go and leave it and concentrate on what you do understand. You can be absolutely sure that in the little portion you're reading there's something for you.

Concentrate on what God is saying and let go of what you don't understand.

I learned this lesson in Egypt because I had a dreadful kind of mind which was like a dog worrying a bone or a cat watching a mouse. You know, the kind of thing that couldn't let go, couldn't let go. And I used to get hold of a problem, say something about the—for example, in the Book of Acts:

Well, now I would get hold of that and I worry and worry myself. Then how can it say "whosoever will may come"? How can it say that?

And I remember once I was in Port Said, I ruined one of the times these two dear old missionaries in the morning when we gathered round the table around an open Bible because I was worrying and worrying and worrying about this problem and I couldn't get an answer out of them, you see.

And so I said, "But it must—there must be some answer." And finally the oldest one of the two said to me, "You must be humble in your approach to God's word."

She said, "I have studied the Bible most of my life." And she said, "Look." And she showed me her Bible which had very wide margins and there were written all notes in her handwriting and against some was a question mark and the date and then underneath there was another date and it just had "understood" and she said, "Now, when I came up against that problem, I couldn't understand it. I said, 'Lord, are you going to show me this today?'"

And then she said, "I'd think about it and nothing would come to me. I didn't worry about it. I'd learned the lesson," she said, "to be humble in the approach to God's word. And I put a question mark in the margin and put the date."

And then she said, "Sometimes it so happened, I heard a word and I thought, 'That's it explained.' Or," she said, "I came to read it again and I read it and I saw the question mark and I thought, 'Whatever was wrong with me then? That's perfectly plain to me. Why ever did I put a question mark in there?'" See? So then she would put next to it, "understood" and put the date.

Now you see, this is what happens if you grow, if you're humble enough to leave things and grow. Of course, it doesn't mean to say that we must put up with all kinds of problems and mysteries in the word. But the thing to do is, when you come up against a problem in your reading or study of God's word, ask Him about it. And if He doesn't reveal it to you, don't bother. Go on like a child. Don't bother about what you can't understand. Go on to what you can understand.

If you bother like I used to, so much about what you can't understand, you won't get what you can understand. You see, you're so bothered about circling round and round like a whirlpool. You're sucked into it and you never get to the harbour.

So remember, humility is very important.

Bible Aids and Tools

Then the fifth thing I want to just say something about this evening is the helpfulness of Bible aids.

Now, I've said some harsh things about commentaries and notes and so on, and I'm not going to take those back at present. But I am going to say that Bible aids (and they are different to Bible commentaries and notes and exposition and so on) Bible aids are invaluable.

Essential Tools for Serious Bible Study

Now, what are Bible aids? Well, if you want to seriously study and read God's word, you must have a good concordance or a good word dictionary. I put over here Young's Concordance. Here is Young's Concordance. You see, every single word in the English Bible is in this volume.

And all you have to do in the Authorised Version rendering is to find the word and look it up, and there you'll find all the different words translated by that one word. And you'll find out the shade of meaning of the particular word that's in the verse or passage you're reading.

Now, I won't spend longer on explaining or showing you how to use a concordance. A lot of you will know, but some of you may not. And I'll be only too willing afterwards to show you how to use a concordance. It's invaluable. Once you start using a concordance, it's well worth three pounds to get a concordance like that because it's invaluable to Bible study.

Now, I'm not talking about that little Cruden's concordance, concordance that is so in fashion amongst many of you. I'm talking about Young's or Strong's. All Cruden does is tell you where a particular word is used, but it doesn't tell you if it's the same Greek or Hebrew word or a different one. But Young's will tell you immediately exactly what is the word used and what particular shade of meaning it has.

We could say an awful lot about that, but there we are. Now there are two good Bible dictionaries that I have put out here, New Testament ones. One is—the simplest person in this room should be able to use this. That's Vine's Dictionary of New Testament words. Really, you don't need much intelligence to use that. And then there's this one, A Critical Lexicon and Concordance by Bullinger. And that's another marvellous work.

Now, if any of you really want to understand what is the meaning of that word, you must have one or other of these dictionaries. These are Bible aids. They don't tell you what the compiler thinks, they tell you what it means. That's all. And that's what you and I want to know, isn't it? We want to get down to what God's word means. And these are Bible aids to our understanding of God's word.

Methods of Bible Study

Then I must go on very swiftly. Again, I'd like to say something about devotional reading of the Bible.

Devotional Reading

We can never overemphasize the need to regard God's word as our spiritual food, and therefore we need to take some part of it each day and thoroughly digest it. We can never over-emphasise the need of taking some part of God's word and digesting it each day.

If you have one huge meal and you don't eat for a week, you'll suffer physically—you will. I won't tell you how, but you will suffer because you are meant to have regular meals, not to gorge now and again. It doesn't do you good.

And consequently, spiritually, you need to regularly feed upon God's word. It's good to have a definite scheme or plan of reading rather than to be haphazard.

Comprehensive Study

And then I'd just like to say something very briefly about comprehensively studying the Bible. I've used this word, comprehensive study of the Bible with this idea that there is a very real place for reading a whole book through. And it's an essential form of Bible study.

Now then, you take a book and read through from beginning to end without any reference to chapters and verses at all. Ignore them altogether, just as if they did not exist. And start from the beginning and read right the way through.

Do you know that Campbell Morgan never preached on a book of the Bible till he had read it through consecutively 14 times. Do you know that Brother Nee read through the New Testament 21 times from the beginning of Matthew to the end of Revelation, before he first started to preach—right through from beginning to end, sat down and read it through again and again.

Do you know how long it would take you to read the whole Bible through from beginning to end? Sixty-six hours. So it's reckoned.

Analytical Study

And then again, I'd just like to say there is another kind of study of the Bible. We can call it the analytical study. This is an absolutely exhaustive way of studying God's word and one of the most valuable.

How do you do it? Well, it's not so much concerned with the book and the overall theme as the meaning of each phrase, almost each word. So it's a verse by verse study, phrase by phrase study of the Bible using the cross-references, using concordance, and using other versions.

Topical Study

There's the topical way of studying God's word. Well, take types or symbols. For instance, take the dove. Now take your concordance and look up the word dove. And then look up every single reference through the Bible to the word dove. And think about it.

And then there are places. Think of the word Hebron. Do you know what the word Hebron means? It means company—the place in the river where people have to cross together. So it came to mean fellowship.

Biographical Study

Then there's the biographical way of studying God's word. Well, take an example. Take Demas. Look it up in the concordance. Three times Demas is mentioned.

In Philemon, Paul says, "My beloved fellow worker, Demas." The second time he mentions him chronologically in Colossians, it's just "Demas." No "beloved fellow worker." The last time he's mentioned in 2 Timothy, it's "Demas hath forsaken me having loved this present world."

You've got a biography, three words.

Prophetic Study

And lastly, another way of Bible study is prophecy. Of course, you've got to be careful here. You can go off the rails. But also we must give prophecy its rightful place.

These are all ways of studying the Bible. There's no need for Bible study to be heavy and hard and difficult. You've got to give time, you've got to be serious. You've got to rely upon the Holy Spirit. But my word, Bible study can be enthralling.

Conclusion: The True Objective

Of course, that's not its main objective—to enthrall us. The objective of the Holy Spirit is not that we might just be enthralled by God's word. It is that we might be fed by God's word. We may be corrected by God's word. We may be built up by God's word. We may be strengthened by God's word. We may be brought on to full growth by God's word. We may be enabled to minister to others through God's word. We are to be fed and instructed and enlightened through the word of God.

Nevertheless, it doesn't have to be a penance, you know. I'm sure the Lord never gave us this wonderful, wonderful book that Christians might suffer over it with an ice bag on their head and a cup of strong coffee by the side, burning the midnight hours, sort of thinking, "Oh, what a penance Bible study is, how difficult and laborious it is."

I'm sure the Lord never gave us His word to be like that. God gave us His word, that it might really help us, that we might every time go away with a sense, "Oh, how unsearchable are the ways of God past finding out." That's what we should go away with from an atmosphere like that every time. "Oh, is this the word of God? How amazing, how wonderful and how gracious of God to bring a sinner like me into an understanding like this."

About Lance Lambert

Lance Lambert was one of the most distinguished Bible scholars and speakers in Israel in our day. He had an itinerant teaching ministry worldwide.

Born in 1931, Lance grew up in Richmond, Surrey and came to know the Lord at twelve years of age. Later in life, Lance discovered his Jewish ancestry and became an Israeli citizen in 1980, making his home next to the Old City of Jerusalem.

Lance became noted for his eschatological views, which placed him in the tradition of Watchman Nee and T. Austin-Sparks.