Learning about the Word of God

(Disclaimer: I hope to be constantly learning about the Word of God, so this should be just the first of many blog posts with this same basic title!)

So today was a big day for me in the growing up process - I joined the Women in the Word bible study at my church, Christ Chapel Bible Church! For those who don't know, I've been a member of CCBC since I was in college and I've been on staff with the college ministry for about 6.5 years. I wouldn't even know how to begin counting how many times I've been the leader of a bible study, but I did realize at some point last semester that it's been years since I've simply been a member of a small group - not leading, just sitting under someone else's leadership and participating. Not that I haven't been poured into! I have amazing bosses who take their job to shepherd me seriously and I've got great accountability with my friends, but I just felt convicted that I needed to do the small group thing. After considering multiple options, I found out that my friend Chavon was wanting the same thing and we decided to become more involved in the women's ministry together. Every Thursday morning a couple hundred women show up to the church, split into small groups to discuss Scripture together for about 45 minutes, and then gather in the sanctuary for large group teaching. Our new series is going through the book of Mark. (If you're interested, you can actually check out the lectures and lesson notes here.)

This morning was all about Mark 1. I've read this book multiple times, but what I love about Scripture is that every time you read it you are a different person because God is constantly changing us, so it speaks to us differently at different times. Every single time there's something new to apply to my life. Every single time there's something new to meditate on about Jesus and what He did for me. Every Single Time.


And yet - there are days when I only read it out of a sense of obligation. There are days when I think I should read it but I don't because I'm tired or busy or wanting to watch TV instead. There are days when I don't even think about reading it. Which is absolute insanity because it is God Himself speaking directly to me! Why wouldn't I want to read it?!

In Mark 1.12-13, we see a mega-brief (in totally Mark fashion) description of Jesus being tempted in the desert. We read Matthew 4.1-11 to get a more full picture of what that was like. One thing we noted was that Jesus answered every temptation Satan offered with Scripture. He knew the Word so well that He was able to answer anything Satan threw at Him with it. But another thing we talked about was that Satan also quoted Scripture. When his first temptation didn't work, Satan quoted Psalm 91 as he tried to get Jesus to throw Himself off the temple. Sure, he quoted it out of context and was using it to try to get Jesus to manipulate God, but he quoted Scripture. This got me thinking. Do I know the Word of God well enough that I can tell when someone is misusing it? Will I know when someone quotes Scripture out of context to warp its meaning to fit their own purposes? Or will I hear someone cite a Bible passage and passively assume they're using it right? We simply can't let Satan know the Bible better than we do! He is the father of lies and we are the sons and daughters of Truth Himself! If Satan studies the Bible to have it on the tip of his tongue to use in his evil schemes, we've got to have it written on our hearts to use when we come up against him.

So...have you read your Bible today?