I struggle to understand the scriptures.
I can’t tell you that I struggle enough, mind you, but I struggle.
I have spent countless hours (though God will know the count), reading and pondering and discussing them. And surely, I have written and rewritten many thousands of pages, trying to make sense of the Bible, and of its various parts. I’ve written about things like:
- What it is
- What it isn’t
- What it might mean
- What it cannot mean
- Who it’s for
- Who it isn’t for
And I’ve likely learned a few thousand things―some of them right, even!
But in all this time (I’m 58 years old), my understanding hasn’t come anywhere near the understanding that God has:
As the heavens are higher than the earth,
God. Isaiah 55:9. NIV.
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
In fact, for all my study, perhaps this one verse is the main lesson I have learned from it so far. I’m still struggling to understand Genesis 1. And 2. And 3. And 4. And I don’t think I’ve got the half of it down yet. If I had to choose how to describe myself as a Bible student, I might be tempted to say “sophomore”― which sounds at once both humble, and not without its accomplishments. But when I give diligent thought to the term “toddler”, I must admit that it seems quite appropriate, too. Yes, I’m learning, but there’s plenty of stumbling and falling and ham-fisted wrangling, too.
If I Were Rich
If I were rich, I’m pretty sure I would hire some number of research assistants to speed up my Bible research. I’d send them off daily in search of evidence in support (or contradiction) of this or that idea, testing my understanding of what the scriptures say. And we’d have weekly roundtable discussions of the big picture. And I’d hire a personal manager to help keep me on task with all that, while also taking care of my own personal life (including my health, which has taken quite a hit sitting in this chair at my computer all these years, rather than exercising as much my body needs).
But I am not rich. And it’s very hard to find assistance in the various Bible discussion forums in which I have participated. It seems that, for whatever reasons, few others are on the same quest to understand. Where I would expect there might be a great many people eager to discuss and search and to weigh ideas authentically, I find very few. Very few, indeed.
Surely, many will think I am wrong about this or that, but most seem to keep it to themselves, and will not tell me what they think I have got wrong, and how. Sure, some tell me, but I’m pretty sure that 99 out of a hundred times, those conversations never last beyond the first few rounds, as I test their objections and their ideas and their proofs and reasoning. That is to say that while there are some who are eager to have me know they think I am wrong, there do not seem to be many who are eager to stay the course, and to see a matter through to its end.
The end of a matter is better than its beginning,
Solomon. Ecclesiastes 7:8. NIV.
and patience is better than pride.
Indeed, few seem interested in hearing out everything the scriptures have to say on a subject, and are much too quick to seize upon a conclusion (they like), without having heard out what all God and the prophets have had to say about it.
Now all has been heard;
Solomon. Ecclesiastes 12:13-14. NIV.
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the duty of all mankind.
For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.
What I mean to say about them is this: They may have their pride and confidence in their various conclusions on Bible topics, but so many don’t seem to be living in the spirit of Solomon’s conclusions here. That is, they don’t seem to be living like people who expect both their good and bad deeds to be judged by God.
But What About Me?
My years in the Bible have revealed a great many faults in my being. I am messy and prickly and inconsistent. I am slow to understand; slow to learn; slow to listen, and slow to seek out a matter. I can be fierce and harsh. I can be petty. I can be sloppy with fact, logic, reasoning, and sourcing. I can be irresponsible. My memory is not as reliable as I’d like to think. I jump to conclusions too hastily, and don’t vet things enough before believing or disbelieving them, and am often overconfident in my own conclusions, not considering them to be in “provisional” status long enough, but impatient to reach confident conclusions.
Even so, I must be fair about myself, and admit that even with all these faults, I do keep at it; I do keep studying, and I do keep revising my understanding, at whatever rate. And I do keep wondering and searching and asking questions of the texts.
My Most Constant Study Partner
I’m frequently in Bible discussions, both online, and in person. Much of this is with my wife and son, and much of it is in various online groups. But the way it has worked out, my most constant study partner is a Facebook friend who lives several states away. He’s a Hebrew scholar who has a similar desire to understand God, and who also seems quite keen on Solomon’s conclusions above. It’s not unusual for us to chat daily on Messenger about the scriptures, and I doubt a week has gone by without such a discussion in some years now. We are sure about many things, and we wonder about many things. We know there are many things we don’t understand, and we’re pretty sure we’ve still got some things wrong. We’re both frustrated at the apparent scarcity of others who are as eager to look into things as we are. And we both feel as if we are getting somewhere.
My Gut
For what it’s worth―and this may be as much an outcropping of my arrogance as a statement of my desires―my gut tells me I should be in the Bible study business full time. Surely, I have exceeded 40 hours a week of study and writing a great many times as a volunteer (though I certainly don’t want to give the impression that I do this all the time, for there are surely some weeks in which I do not study at all―though I doubt there’s a week when I’m not deep in thought about it all.) My point is that I seem well-suited to spending full-time hours working on such things.
But what’s the point? Sure, it’s good for me
…what kind of people ought you to be?
Peter. 2 Peter 3:11. NIV.
Peter’s own answer to that question, by the way, was this: “You ought to live holy and godly lives…”
Well, this is where it starts sounding a bit absurd. That is, why would it ever make sense for a guy like me, with so many flaws, to be working full-time as a Bible researcher/writer/teacher/podcaster? Well, it makes no sense at all, unless I’d be doing it humbly, as a mere fellow traveler, who seems to have the disposition to focus on these things many hours a week. In that way, it would seem (to me) to make some sense to share my findings and ponderings with others who are similarly interested, and especially if they don’t have the time or skills to do such study for themselves.
Glimpses
It doesn’t seem to me, however, that many are interested in looking long-term into the Bible. I’ll run across people from time to time who are eager to dig into some Bible topic or other, but it’s very rare for any such conversation to be still going on after a week. It seems that most people don’t operate that way, and aren’t really in it for the long-haul. Instead, they’ll take a glimpse now and then, and then move along, as if such things aren’t well-suited for long-term investigation and consideration.
But my habits are different. Please consider these words God spoke to the Israelites after delivering them out of slavery in Egypt. This is what I think God wants also from Christians:
Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them fade from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them.
God. Deuteronomy 4:9. NIV.
Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 19 Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 20 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates, 21 so that your days and the days of your children may be many in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors, as many as the days that the heavens are above the earth.
God. Deuteronomy 11:18-21. NIV.
To my great frustration, many will foolishly do this sort of fixating with “grace” (and a few other attractive topics), while ignoring the rest of the topics in scripture―things inspired by the same Holy Spirit who inspired the grace passages. So, frustratingly, these people will be quick to agree outwardly thus: “Absolutely, Jack! I love those Deuteronomy passages!”. But their view of what these passages mean and my view don’t really match well at all.
If they were really doing what these passages teach, they’d be much more able to carry on an extended dialog about the scriptures than they are. “Grace” seems to be all they want. But in my experience, when you leave out the rest of the scriptures, it tends to twist your view of grace quite severely. And I think they do this to their own destruction
2 Peter 3:14 So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him. 15 Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. 16 He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.
Peter. 2 Peter 3:14-16. NIV.
I grew up in a church that did this sort of Bible work―cherrypicking the verses that made them feel good, and ignoring (and even twisting!) the rest. Thankfully, I learned my way out of that, and leveled-up a couple of times, passing through the cultures of other church camps. And even though some of them made much more of Bible study than did that first camp, I have not found any who are fully settled on Solomon’s conclusion in Ecclesiastes 12:13-14, which I repeat here for your convenience:
Now all has been heard;
Solomon. Ecclesiastes 12:13-14. NIV.
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the duty of all mankind.
For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.
And they ignore Peter’s question, “…what kind of people ought you to be?”, thinking instead that Jesus’ grace somehow trumps the importance of this question for the believer. But I have reached different conclusions by struggling to understand the Bible on a grander scale―with a view to a wider scope of information. The way I see it, God has delivered all these scriptures to our generation for our consideration, and it’s a dangerous practice to pick and choose which of them we’d like to take to heart.
Dealing With It All
But dealing with it all is scary business. This is because if you wrestle with all the scriptures, it will eventually expose all your heart in time, and most of us aren’t willing to be exposed. But such exposure is the very essence of coming to Jesus, is it not?:
19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.
John. John 3:19-21. NIV.
So, dealing (honestly, rationally, and responsibly) with the whole of scripture―if indeed that is what I am doing―is to offer oneself up wholly to God, to be willing to be exposed in all one’s thoughts and ways
And what a humiliating thing it is, to take one’s imperfect self and apply it to understanding the very scriptures that convict one even more about his imperfections! This is why that word, “toddler” keeps coming back to mind―and why the word “sophomore” seems too puffed up.
Even so, I see that so many want to think of themselves as upperclassmen, at least, if not teachers and masters and headmasters. Yet, I’m pretty sure they did not develop such self-views from the texts themselves, for the texts would show their faults and disqualifications, and would not support their pride.
Yet even so, here I sit, still thinking there ought to be a full-time job for me in all this Bible business. And perhaps it is a very good thing, I can reason, that there is not. Surely, I am not without my pride, even after all these years. And surely, there is much danger in being in a leader role. Yet, at the same time, there’s a whole world in the scriptures that most have not discovered, and it seems they could use an occasional tour guide to point them in the right direction, even if they can only handle it at present in occasional glimpses, and not as a lifelong avocation, which seems to me to be what God had in mind for all believers.
What Can I Do?
So what can I do but to keep going? I doubt I’ll ever earn a living from reading, studying, teaching, and writing about the Bible (unless I turn to the dark side, and offer up teachings that help people deceive themselves that godliness is easier than it really is). Indeed, I can’t even earn enough from it to cover the $700-or-so a year it keeps to maintain hosting for my podcast website and for the audio files. I’ll likely never have the money to hire research assistants, and can’t even find a group of highly-motivated peers who see the value of deep study.
What, then, shall I do? Quit?
No, because even if there’s no other reason to study and write but for the value of my own mental processing of the scriptures, it has still proven quite necessary for my own growth. And I think that my own growth is why I was put in this world, where the growing is both necessary and possible. So, this is my way of doing that, processing the scriptures as I go―clumsy as I may be at it, and as irritating and difficult as it may be for others to consider my findings and my questions.
Nearly 100% of the help I get is help I have asked for. Rarely does a volunteer appear from out of the blue, offering help. And when they do, their help is as apt to be erroneous as good and accurate―just as the help I offer to others is not always spot on.
We all are messy and prickly and inconsistent. And I, for one, am very frustrated that we’re not all much more engaged in wrestling with the scriptures than we are. I find it invigorating to be in an eager-and-interested, fact-seeking, understanding-seeking conversation about the scriptures. And I really hope that if I am invited to live with God in Heaven when I’m done here on this Earth, that I’ll get to have conversations about the scriptures there, rather than just receiving some complete download of knowledge and understanding. I find the interaction and discovery to be thrilling and edifying.
And I do think this is what God had in mind for believers in this present world, yet it turns out that not all are interested in this―not even in the churches. In fact, many of the churches seem to have designed themselves to be havens for those who aren’t deeply interested in the whole of the scriptures. And I don’t seem to have found the spark that can motivate them otherwise.
Surely, anyone could easily shun me based on my many sins and shortcomings. Indeed, it is not hard to see what’s wrong with me. But my sincere wish is that they were interested in seeing what I think I see in the scriptures―even though I might still be wrong about the half of it.
This lack of interest is a great and constant sadness to me. I think that my enjoyment of this world would be much greater if I had a viable and sizable group of friends who were similarly eager about wide-scoped Bible study. And I can tell myself that my dissatisfaction with the way things are is merely a signal of the righteousness of my own heart. That is, that I am one of those right-hearted people who were “looking for a country of their own”:
13 All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. 14 People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.
Hebrews 11:13-16. NIV.
I realize that I could be telling myself all this―that my dissatisfaction with the Bible-study-based fellowship I have with people is a signal that I’m one of the few godly ones, and most of the rest aren’t―when really, it’s because I’m proud and unloving and ungracious, and such, and just can’t seem to get along well with anybody. (Surely, there are some who think exactly this about me, whether they’re willing to say it to my face or not!)
Indeed, it’s hard to give an accurate account for myself, for I’m not in much of a spot to see myself clearly―not nearly like God would, nor as would those who have gone on to that heavenly country, having left this world for that one, and having since learned its ways. It’s probably true about me that I study the scriptures more than most do, as well as that I seek more input from friends regarding how well I’m thinking about things than most do. (I suppose you’d have to ask my friends about this.) But even if I’m right about that, it doesn’t mean that I’m doing it enough, nor making enough of the input I get!
All I can tell you is that I do struggle to understand these things. And it occurs to the writer in me to say something humble at this point, like, “…and I’ll leave it to my audience to determine how well I’m doing with all this.” But really, it doesn’t matter at the end of the day what anybody but God thinks about me, as he’s the one who is to judge me. And I realize that I swim at my own risk in all this―in what I study, and how, and in how I reason about it, and talk and write and debate about it, and in how I put it into practice, and in how I size up for myself how I’m doing with all of this. It’s 100% Jack. And it makes all the sense in the world to me that God would have a talk with me when I’m done, so as to let me know how I did.
And as scary as that thought is, I welcome it, knowing that there could not possibly be a more fitting judgment of me than the judgment that will come from the mind of God. And if he counts me unworthy of that Holy City, who could say he’s got it wrong? Indeed, if he were to send me to the Lake of Fire, I think I would feel quite compelled to tell him he was right and just in his judgments. Perhaps I would surprise myself with pride that I have hidden from myself, but I do not think I would argue with him about that.
I think I know this: That nobody, myself included, gets into that Holy City without God having exercised his grace and forgiveness to make it so. Yet it is God himself who uses (surprising-to-some)language like “worthy” and “righteous” to describe those who are invited there at the end of their days. So, whatever it is about a human heart that God would consider “worthy”, despite their shortcomings and immaturity and errors and sins, I’m hoping to learn that very well before I die.
And as of right now, I think that that lesson is written into the passages I’ve quoted above, as well as into this one:
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
Micah 6:8. NIV.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.
The better I get at this―if indeed I am getting better at it at all―the more I see my failures (I think). Yes, I do see my successes, too―or at least some of them―so it’s not like I’m unable to exercise any fairness at all in my self-view. But just how fair I am in that view is a question best judged by God (of course!).
But I will tell you this quite forthcomingly: I do struggle to understand the scriptures. I think I’m making progress. And I think it’s worth it. I wish I could manage to work more of it into my schedule. And I wish it was more common to find others who would volunteer to help me set some of the pieces of this grand puzzle in the right place―and especially from those who have developed the skills for wide-ranging consideration and study.
But it is what it is. I have one lifetime to life, and this is it!
I wish I could report back to you all how it goes whenever I die, so you could see the end of my particular story―whether God invites me in, or rejects me. But that’s not the way it works in this world!
I have to say this, though: Either way, whether I make it or not, I’m glad that God’s ways and thoughts are so far beyond my own. I’m glad that there’s so much beyond the mere self of me―so much to be explored and wondered at, and maybe grasped, at least in part. And that is why I struggle to understand the scriptures.
