Introduction

So we’re going to continue “How to Read Your Bible, Part 2.” There are note-taking sheets—if you don’t have one, raise your hand. Remember, for your binders and sheets to help you take notes during the week, during your quiet time, those daily quiet time notes are in the back. It’s two pages per week, so pick those up on your way out. To remind you, every week we will have the notes for the message as well as on the back in front of the Q&A box.

So we’re going to talk about how to read the Bible. How do you read the Bible? This is important. We talked last time about reading the Bible with faith—you can’t read it rightly without the Holy Spirit removing the veil and without a changed heart. But the reality is we have to actually sit in the chair. We have to look at the Word with our eyes, or listen to a sermon with our ears, and observe what’s in the text. God’s Word doesn’t change your heart like magic words (“abracadabra,” “bippity boppity boo,” or any of those) because those words are meaningless sounds. God’s Word changes your heart as it goes into your ears or through your eyes to your mind, and you understand it. It doesn’t do much just staying in your mind, right? We learned you don’t have to be born again to understand the grammar or the meaning of John 3:16—you have to be a new creature to believe it. It’s not going to get to your heart so you can believe, obey, and trust God except through paying attention, by actually sitting down, keeping your bottom in the chair, your eyes on the page, reading the words, and understanding.

Next meeting, probably the week after, we’re going to go through how to do that. We’ll share tips and helps for observing and interpreting the text. But before we jump into that—yes, I keep saying I can’t wait to do that—there has to be one more thing. Before you can read the Bible well, you have to know what the Bible is.

What the Bible Is

The Bible is different from any other book. Lots of books can change the way you think or give you information. They can change the way you see the world, maybe increase what you know. But there’s only one book that can change your very nature, that can change your heart, your relationship with God, and your eternity. That’s God’s Word. God’s Word has power because of what it is. So we have to start by recognizing: what is God’s Word?

Some of you might know this, some might not. The Bible has 66 books in it. It was written by about 40 men over more than 1,500 years. There’s the Old Testament, written before Jesus, and the New Testament, written after Jesus, about Jesus and the church. There were more than 40 men who wrote this over 1,500 years, yet the Bible is one book, one complete book, with one Divine Author. The Bible says of itself that it is God’s inspired words—God’s self-revelation. Each book of the Bible, as you read, will have the characteristics of the person who wrote it and lie in the context in which it was written, yet be true in every single word because it was inspired by God.

The Doctrine of Inspiration

We’re going to start with the doctrine of inspiration: that every word in the Bible is inspired. What does that mean? A better word might be “expired,” but that sounds weird, so we say “inspired.” We get that from 2 Timothy 3:16. We’re going to have a lot of Bible verses today, and we won’t have time to dig into all of them, so you might want to write down the references.

If I say something that doesn’t make sense, or if you think, “I want to believe that—how?” then put it in the Q&A box. I anticipate there will be lots of questions about God’s Word. Let’s read what God’s Word says about itself. It says, “All Scripture…”—is there any Scripture not included in that statement?—“…is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” I want you to focus on that: it’s “breathed out by God.” That’s where we get “inspired,” but actually, it’s God breathing out. When you talk, you breathe out. Every word, even though people wrote it, was as if God breathed it out and said it. God actually said those words.

This doesn’t mean God took over the person like an avatar and wrote the words for him. When Peter wrote, Peter wrote; God wrote. When Paul wrote, Paul wrote; God wrote. The same is true for every other author. Peter himself, as he was writing Scripture, describes it: “No prophecy of Scripture was ever produced by the will of man.” Yet each man sat down to write a book—like Paul writing to Philemon. Paul wanted to write, but Paul’s will wasn’t ultimate. God’s will was ultimate. “No prophecy of Scripture was ever produced merely by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” The writing retains the personal characteristics of who wrote it. Paul sounds different than John, who sounds different than Peter, Isaiah, or Ezekiel, but they didn’t write merely their own words, even though they are their words.

Jesus says, “Haven’t you read Moses?” Yet when Jesus quotes Moses, it can also be said, “Didn’t God say?” That happens all over Scripture. You might see Isaiah wrote something, and also it’s said, “God said.” It’s the same words. Sometimes God dictated word-for-word (like in Exodus 34:27 or Revelation 2). But most of the time, God’s words were “breathed out” as men were carried along by the Holy Spirit so that the words had dual authorship—Paul’s words but also God’s words.

We see that in 1 Thessalonians 2: “We thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God which you heard from us”—so Paul spoke and preached—“you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God.” That was at work in the believers. God’s Word—every word of it in Scripture—is God’s very words. There are no words of Scripture that don’t fall under that. Every single word in the Bible, in the autographic manuscripts—meaning the text originally written by the original authors and recipients—was inspired. Jesus refers to the words of Moses, the Psalms, and the prophets as God’s Word. In Matthew 4, when He was tempted, He said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word’”—and then He said—“that comes from the mouth of God.” He was being tempted by Satan and quoted the authority of Scripture. He said, “It is written…every word that comes out of the mouth of God,” and He was referring to the written words by prophets, the Psalms, and Moses.

In Hebrews 3, the Holy Spirit “says,” and it quotes Psalm 95. In Acts 1:16, Peter says Scripture had to be fulfilled about Judas: “which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand,” and he quotes Psalm 41. We could go on. I’m not saying every word in the Bible is God’s Word based on my authority; I say it on God’s authority. God Himself says this in His breathed-out Word.

Infallibility

The next thing that follows is that if every word in the Bible is God-breathed, then every word is infallible. That’s a big word—does anyone know what infallible means? It means “unfailable,” unable to fail, unable to be wrong. Have you ever gotten a perfect score on a test? Maybe you were inerrant on that spelling test. But you aren’t infallible—you do enough spelling tests, you’ll fail eventually. A math book with simple addition might be close to inerrant, but no book except the Bible is unable to fail or be wrong. Why? Because the Bible is God-breathed. We must trust every word in it because it’s infallible, inspired by a God who cannot lie.

Hebrews 6:18 says it’s impossible for God to lie. If every word of Scripture is God’s Word, it’s impossible—it’s unfailable. Every word of Scripture will come to pass. In John 10:35, Jesus said Scripture cannot be broken. Joshua 21:45 says not one word of all the good promises that Yahweh made failed; they all came to pass. I love Isaiah 55, which compares God’s Word to rain and snow watering the earth: “so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty… It shall accomplish that which I purpose.” Everything God intends His Word to do will happen because it is God’s Word. It cannot be wrong because God cannot lie.

Inerrancy

Now we get to the point that it doesn’t have any error—only truth. This is where we say the Bible is inerrant. Inerrancy means “without error.” Infallible means “unable to fail.” The Bible cannot err. There is no falsehood in it. And we’re talking about the originals as the authors wrote them. Every word of Paul was God’s Word—true and reliable. When you read about historical events, they really happened. You can trust them. When the Bible says there’s only one way to be saved, you can trust that too.

You might see notes in your Bible saying something like “earliest manuscripts don’t have this verse.” Perhaps there’s a question about whether that verse or word was in the originals. This shouldn’t make you doubt—it should strengthen your trust, because it shows how carefully the Bible has been preserved over thousands of years by scribes copying it before there were photocopiers. Sometimes one copy had a slight difference, but none of these variants affect any key doctrine. Your Bible is transparent about those differences (for example, the last part of Mark, the story of the woman caught in adultery, or a verse here or there). You can trust God’s Word.

Also, when we say the Bible doesn’t have errors, we mean what the Bible actually intends to communicate is true. If it says God created in six days, He did. If it says King David killed Goliath, that really happened. We can trust it. When Mark 1:33 says, “They brought to Him all who were sick, and the whole city was gathered,” it doesn’t mean literally every single person; it’s natural language we all use. If Psalm 23 says, “I lack nothing,” it means something specific, not that you have every single thing you could want. That doesn’t challenge inerrancy. God’s Word is true in the sense it’s intended, even when using round numbers, figures of speech, or phenomenological language like “the sun rises.”

Jesus prayed, “Your word is truth.” Numbers 23:19 is a great verse to memorize: “God is not man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Has He said, and will He not do it?” The sum of God’s Word is truth. Psalm 119 says every one of His righteous rules endures forever. God’s written Word can be trusted to the same degree as if God spoke audibly to you. Don’t say, “I wish I had an audible word from God,” when you have His written Word. If you don’t believe what He already wrote, you wouldn’t believe it if He spoke in a voice. They’re the same words, with the same power and truth, and they have the same authority.

The Bible is free from error in doctrine, history, moral instruction, and everything else it says. Some might say, “The Bible contains truth,” or “The Bible contains God’s words,” but the problem is that can imply there’s some falsehood mixed in as well. That would make us the judges of which parts are true. That’s not how it works. Thomas Jefferson famously cut out the parts he didn’t like and kept only his favorite verses. We might be tempted to do the same if we pick and choose which verses we submit to. We must not do that. We can’t let outside systems or philosophies judge the Bible. If we try to measure it by science, or by what “smart people” say, we’re making something else the authority. But the Bible is true because it’s God’s Word. When we come to God’s Word, we ask God to break our hearts, help us believe and obey it. If the Bible is inspired, infallible, and inerrant, it has authority because it’s God’s Word. We don’t have authority over it—it has authority over us.

Scripture’s Authority

Why does it have authority? Because it comes from God. When we read God’s Word, we don’t stand in judgment of it; it judges us. Colossians 1:16, speaking of Jesus, says: “By Him all things were created…” This is the One who is the Word incarnate. We see this same message in Romans 11—everything is from Him, through Him, and to Him. Psalm 24:1 says, “The earth is Yahweh’s…and those who dwell in it.” Romans 13 affirms there is no authority except from God. So, if these are God’s words, they’re authoritative. Remember, when Jesus was tempted, He referred to the authority of Scripture, saying, “It is written.” He also said He didn’t come to abolish the Law and Prophets, but to fulfill them. Not one letter will pass away until all is fulfilled.

Scripture’s Necessity

Scripture is necessary. You can’t know what you need to know to be saved, honor God, and know who He is, apart from Scripture. It’s necessary for salvation, for life, and for godliness. Acts 4:12 says there is salvation in no one else—only Jesus. You can’t learn that truth just by looking at nature; you need the Bible. Romans 10:13–14 says everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved, but how can they call on Him if they haven’t believed, and how can they believe if they haven’t heard?

You need the Bible. Not only that, but you might say, “Yes, I need the Bible, but I also need a bunch of other stuff.” The truth is, you don’t need anything else for life and godliness other than what the Bible says. Second Timothy says that from childhood, Timothy knew the sacred writings that made him wise for salvation through faith in Christ. There’s nothing else that can do that. God’s Word is necessary.

Scripture’s Sufficiency

It’s also sufficient. Someone might tell you, “Sure, read the Bible, but if you have really bad depression or anxiety, the Bible’s not sufficient for that.” But second Peter says, “His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him.” We get that knowledge from Scripture—God removes the veil from our eyes as we look at Scripture. Everything we need for this life, everything we need to live in a God-honoring way, ends with us being God’s child forever. It’s all found in God’s Word through the help of the Holy Spirit. God’s Word is necessary and sufficient because it is God’s Word.

Scripture’s Clarity

Finally, God’s Word is clear. There’s a word for this called “perspicuity.” It means the Bible can be understood by people through the Holy Spirit’s enlightenment, and we don’t need someone else to interpret everything for us. For about a thousand years, the Catholic Church effectively said, “You can’t understand the Bible on your own; we won’t even let you read it in your own language.” But the Bible itself says otherwise. It is true that you need the Holy Spirit to accept these things because the natural man doesn’t accept the things of God. But Christians have the mind of Christ. God’s Word is written in such a way that everyone has access to it. A child can understand the essentials of the gospel. The Bible isn’t always simple, but it’s clear—understandable—and yet deep enough that even the highest intellect will never exhaust its truths.

Psalm 119 says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” The unfolding of God’s words gives light, imparting understanding to the simple. It can still be hard in places. Peter said in reference to Paul’s writings that some things are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction. If we don’t do the hard work to see what it really means, we can twist it to mean what we want, which leads to destruction. There are many false teachers who say, “This is what God’s Word says,” but the Bible is clear enough for us to test everything by the Word. Think of the Bereans who tested teachings against Scripture.

Conclusion

Peter’s command is to take care, be careful, and grow in grace and knowledge. As you read the Bible, read it well. If you’re going to understand something, you have to do the hard work. We’ll talk more about how to do that—observation, interpretation, application. But if you don’t know what God’s Word is and how important it is to read it well, you might not read it that way.

Next week, we’re going to talk through this: learning understanding for the sake of belief and trust through observation, interpretation, and application. But I want you to really think hard this week and discuss what God’s Word is and how that should affect your reading of it. If you believe everything we’ve said is true, you’re not going to wake up tomorrow and say, “I’ll just skip God’s Word because I don’t really need it.” You won’t read it and say, “I can’t believe that.” Instead, you’ll say, “I want to open God’s Word because I need it. I need to see the God who wrote this Word.” You’ll pray, “God, make me listen, make me understand,” especially when some parts are hard.

If you continue in that path, you’re going to grow. You’re going to die more obedient than you are today, having lived a life glorifying God. Then you’ll see Him as He is—remember what 1 John 3 says—and be made like Him. Let’s go to your discussion groups. Talk about this for about 20 minutes. Read the Bible every day this week, and we’ll see you back here next time.