Around two years ago (ouch, has it really been that long!), I completed the Newfrontiers Leadership Training course. One of those sessions was on Hermenutics (which is the practice of working out the meaning of what the Bible says). It was a fairly standard session – translations of the Bible, the different types of Scripture, the author’s intent etc…
But then Adrian Birks, who was leading the session, said something in a 5 minute window that I will never forget and has changed my entire perspective on reading the Bible. I’m sure I have probably heard it before, but it really stuck out at me.
Adrian was talking about promises in the Bible (particularly when we as Christians read the Psalms) and automatically assume we can take hold of those. Adrian then reminded us how the Psalms are actually the author’s experience of God, and that what they describe is possible for our experience of God but not something you automatically attain to.
Take Psalm 62:1-2 “My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I shall never be shaken” (NIV)
We can read it, we can agree with it. We can pray it, we can even read it out passionately on a Sunday. But do we know it and believe it for ourselves?
I know for myself, that my soul doesn’t always find rest in God alone. It finds rest in reading the news, in sitting on my computer, in spending time with friends. Is God alone my rock? In some areas of my life, but not others – I am tied to my Excel spreadsheet when it comes to finances (another post on that one to come).
Then take Psalm 63:2-5
“I have seen you in the sanctuary
and beheld your power and your glory.
3 Because your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify you.
4 I will praise you as long as I live,
and in your name I will lift up my hands.
5 My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods;
with singing lips my mouth will praise you.”
This is actually my favourite Psalm. But I don’t see God in his sanctuary and behold his power and glory by reading this Psalm – as I used to do. From reading verse 2, you can say that God is powerful and glorious, but you haven’t experienced it, or know it in your heart. Actually reading the Psalms should give us a yearning to know and experience God for ourselves – outside of reading the Bible. In just spending time with him, worshipping him, living our day by lives with him at the centre.
“Your love is better than life” – You don’t know it by reading it, you know it by experiencing it!
So now I read the Bible differently – yearning for the experience that the authors had of God for myself, and not just reading it as knowledge or facts about God and my relationship with him is better for it.
How do I do this?
1. Read the experience / emotional response of the authors and ask myself what truth about God are they responding to and how I can do the same in my own life.
2. Have complete confidence that how the authors of the Bible experienced God is how God wants me to experience Him.
3. Pray through the Psalms, asking God that my experience would be like theirs.
4. Aim to discipline myself in active commands. Eg “My soul finds rest in God alone”. Asking God to show me the benefit of doing so and doing my best to make sure I find my rest in Him everyday.
That was probably my biggest take-away from the entire two year course – 5 minutes of revelation. Thanks to Adrian, but most of all, thank you to God for providing his Word to describe the experience of knowing Him, knowing that he wants me to experience Him in the same way too.
Always Learning 