Hermeneutics 099

Now to wrap this up.

This naturally leads to my last point. Think about the intended audience and culture. A lot of the time we read the bible and think every promise and every command and ever word was written to a 21 century man or woman sitting in their comfortable 21st century home and living their 21st century lifestyle. Instead, we ought to realize that a lot of times the words were written to a specific people in a specific culture for a very specific reason, we are a third party. This is not to say that we cannot glean knowledge, wisdom, insight, and instruction from God through the scriptures. We should however always make a point to understand what is going on in the passage as we attempt to learn from the text, and especially before we apply it to our lives. Ask the questions: "Who is being written to/about and why?", and "Is this a specific promise/command for me, or more of a general principle to consider?" Let's change our thinking from "Everything in here was written and meant for me" to "Everything written in here will benefit me, if I appropriately apply it."

My final thought: What bible do you read from? You should find a bible that is easy for you to read. We could argue all day about which one is the best, but it doesn't matter how good it is if you are not reading it because it is too difficult. I think an obvious example is the Old King James; while a decent translation the wording is very foreign and hard for modern day readers to understand. I use ESV and enjoy NKJ, sometimes I'll use NIV for another perspective. I would always counsel you to use the most accurate translation possible. For example the ESV which communicates word for word translation rather than the NIV which communicates thought for thought. But if a paraphrase like The Message is the only one that makes sense to you, I would say read that. My hope would be that as you become more and more accustomed to God's word you would graduate up to a more accurate text. But while going for the most accurate is always a good thing, actually reading the bible is better. So find a translation that will help you get into the word, and not one that hinders you from reading God's message to mankind.