Thursday, November 02, 2006

God's Pursuit of Me

Yesterday, I finished reading through my Bible for the year. I read through The Message because I wanted a fresh take on Scripture because I tend to get to parts I'm familiar with and just skip across them. There were times when I thought, "Does it really say that?!!?" I'd go to another version and sure enough, it did say that. There were other times when it didn't. But it was a new read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. People often ask me which is the best translation of the Bible to read. I really want to say, "The original language." But that would be smart-aleck and glib. So what I say is, "The one that you'll read." Which is almost as smart-aleck and glib, but it's true.
I've also been teaching a class this year called, "How to Read and Study the Bible." It has brought new insights into my life also. There is a tremendous freedom that I have found this year in reading the Scriptures. I hope it continues to resonate in my life as I continue to read about God's pursuit of us. That's the theme of the entire Bible...God's constant pursuit to have a relationship with us. Someone might say, "It's taken you the entire year of reading through the Bible to come up with that?" The answer to that is "No!" It's taken a lifetime of hardships and beatings (not literal, but spiritual) and mistakes, and I still haven't gotten there yet. But I'm learning. I hope you are, too. Have a great day. JW

5 comments:

JD said...

Very good post. Did you use any books for your study? I enjoyed "How to read the Bible for all it's worth" ... but wonder what resource, if any, you used.

drjimwhite said...

JD, thanks for the response. I've used basically three books. The one I've relied on most is How to Read the Boble for All Its Worth by Gordon D. Fee and Douglas Stuart. Kay Arthur has an excellent book called How to Study Your Bible. In talking of hermeneutics, I used the book The Crux of the Matter by Jack Reese, Doug Foster and Greg (?) Childers.

drjimwhite said...

Bible, not Boble

David U said...

Amen on the theme of the Bible!

Congrats on your reading it thru.

I did it with the "Boys Club" you used to be a part of.

DU

JD said...

thanks, jim, that sounds like something I'd like to do ... teach a class like that.