4 Big Reasons to Read Your Bible(Reasons 1 & 2)

2. The Law

Romans 7:7 What then shall we say?  That the law is sin? By no means!  Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin.  For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet."

                              

The Law is important for three reasons. 1. It reveals to us what sin is. 2. It leaves us guilty before God. 3. It teaches us how to live.

1 John 3:4 Everyone who makes a practice sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.

Since sin is going against the Law then shouldn’t we know what the Law is?  How can you know what the Law is if you don't read your Bible.  You want to know what the Law says?  Then read Exodus 20 for a start.  I guarantee that you are guilty of breaking at least a few of these laws.  Once you realize that you are guilty before God for violating his laws then that leads us to reason number 2.

Romans 3:19 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

Now that the law has been made known to you, you will no longer be able to justify your sins because now you know that they are wrong beyond doubt. This leaves the door open for the Gospel because you realize that without some help you are going to be condemned.  This is why the Law is such an important part of evangelizing, because it is only through the Law that people realize their deep need for the grace of Jesus Christ. How can we make them realize their need of grace if we as Christians do not even know the Law?  It also ties into an earlier point I made about how the Bible teaches us to live.

Romans 7:22 For I delight in the Law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

This is a very important passage because it shows that while we should take delight in the Law it is impossible for us to keep it.  It also shows that it is very important for us to TRY to follow the Law in a pursuit of righteousness.  Just because we are Christians and freed from the Law does not give us license to disobey it.  On the Contrary.

1 John 3:9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep sinning because he has been born of God. 

Notice that it says that, "no one born of God makes a PRACTICE of sinning." It does not say that one who is born of God does not sin, just that they do not willfully sin.  So therefore it is important for us Christians to study the Law of God so the sins that we are not yet conscious of may be revealed to us in order that we might correct them in our pursuit of righteousness.

1. The Gospel Message

Romans 1:16 - For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for the salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jews first and also to the Greek . 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith."

This passage gives a definition for what the Gospel is.  It is the power of salvation for anyone who believes.  Well, believes in what exactly?

Romans 10:9 - because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

It is important to realize that Jesus came and was the fulfillment of the Law.  Because God must be just and cannot let sin go unpunished He sent His one and only Son to bear the punishment for our sins (death) so that we can be safe from His wrath.  This is the gospel message.  That we who are guilty sinners are saved from God's just wrath by the blood that was shed by Jesus (who was guiltless before the Law) when He was crucified on the cross.  God further showed His power over death and thus showed us His power to save us from death when He raised Jesus from the dead after three days.

Romans 5:8 but God showed his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned alread , because he has not believed in the name of the Son of God.

We have seen how the Law keeps people from justifying their sin.  So it is important that after we have stopped their own justifications that we let them know the Gospel so that they might truly be justified before God. 

Romans 3:23 for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through  the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

How can we hope to spread the Gospel without knowing exactly what it is?  These are just a few clarified verses that help explain exactly what the Gospel is, but I cannot describe to you the feeling of awe that will fill you when you are reading the Bible on your own and you come to the realization that the Gospel isn't one of the many themes in the Bible.  It IS the theme of the Bible.  The more you read, the more you will begin to realize that the whole Bible tells of the Gospel and that all of its passages are tied to the Gospel.

The Bible does not need to be modernized or revamped or spiced up in order to get people interested.  The Bible simply needs to be taught so that people can realize on their own just how wonderful it is. You won't realize this if you think of the Bible as a textbook.  Its wonder and majesty can only be realized when you have that eureka moment when you realize that it is God's Word to you.   Every time I read from it I am left in awe and wonder and I want more.  The Bible is fascinating.  The more you read, the more you understand how it all ties together and you just can't get enough of it.  

Judged by Righteousness

Psalms 9:7 But the LORD sits enthroned forever; he has established his throne for justice, 8 and he judges the world with righteousness; he judges the people with uprightness.

I have discussed how God is both our Creator and our King.  Today we are going to look at a much trickier aspect of God and that is God as our Judge.  What gives God the right to judge us? Well, He did create us and as our King He gave us laws to follow so logically who better to be our judge than God?  The Bible states in the above verses and in other places (Acts 17:30) that when God judges us, He will judge us in righteousness because He is a righteous judge. Psalms 7:11 God is a righteous judge, and a God who feels indignation every day. So that begs the question, what is righteousness?

This is where things can get tricky.  It's very important that you don't rely on just what I point out here, but that you also open up your Bible and discover all it says about the subject of what it means to be righteous because the word "righteous" appears in the Bible (ESV translation) two hundred and sixty-two times.  The word "righteousness" appears two hundred and fifty-nine times. Clearly the Bible has a lot to say on the subject that I can't fit into one post, so please do some research on your own.  However, I am going to try to explain the concept of biblical righteousness as best I can.

First let's ask the question, who is righteous before God? Psalm 143:2 Enter not into judgment with your servant, for no one living is righteous before you. There you have it.  No one who is alive is righteous before God.  Even Jesus backs this up. Mark 10:18 and Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone." Why is no one good?  Because God gave us His standard of righteousness in the law.  These laws embody who God is.  The laws that God gave the people of Israel are a description of God because they outline His very nature. In order for a person to be righteous he must keep God's commandments.  However, this is an impossible task.  All anyone has to do is go through the Ten Commandments to discover that they are guilty of breaking these laws, are therefore unrighteous in the eyes of God. 

You may be asking yourself what you can do in order to be judged worthy to get to heaven, and the answer to that question is that there is nothing you can do to get to heaven. Romans 5:17 For if, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in the life through one man Jesus Christ.    Paul tells us here that righteousness is in fact a free gift of God through the death of His Son Jesus.  Just as one man's actions (Adam) caused the rest of us to have a nature of sin, so it is that we can receive righteousness through the actions of Jesus.  But the most important thing to take away from that verse is that righteousness cannot be earned by anything that you or I do as people because it will be given to us as a freely given gift of grace. 

But it is important to point out that God will not force this gift upon you.  If you don't want any part of the grace offered to you then God will not make you accept it and give it to you anyway.  God has offered you the gift, but it is you who must accept it.  The Bible says in both Genesis 15:6 and in Romans 4:3 that all Abraham had to do was to believe and it was credited to him as righteousness.  So what does this have to with you? Romans 10:9 because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.  All you have to do is truly believe that God gave His Son to die for your sins and raised Him from the dead after three days in a victory over death, then confess that fact with your mouth.  Because if you truly believe then you are going to recognize your sins and the unrighteousness in your life and you are going to give those up in a pursuit of righteousness.  While The Bible tells us that we cannot obtain righteousness by the works of our hands, we are to pursue righteousness.

1 Timothy 6:11 But as for you, O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. 12 Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. 13 I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, 14 to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 which he will display at the proper time- he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, 16 who alone has immortality, who dwells in the unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see.  To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.

Lord of Creation

Isaiah 40:28 Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; His understanding is unsearchable.

Who is God?  That is a mighty big question.  The above verse in Isaiah 40 gives as good an explanation as can be said in short.  God is the Creator of the universe.  Of course, since He is the creator, He is also a great many other things.  For instance, He created us so therefore He rules over us as our eternal King.  As the King and Lord of creation, He handed down His laws to Moses in the form of the Ten Commandments.  This also makes Him our Judge.  These are just the three aspects of God that can be derived by His act of creating us as well as the world around us. Over the next few posts I am going to be addressing the different aspects of just who exactly God is.  This one will be dealing with God's role as our creator.

First, I am going to prove to you that God did create everything we see around us.  The odds are that you are reading this either on a computer or a smart phone.  Where did it come from? Someone in a factory put it together of course.  But you know that someone created it because the evidence is there before your eyes.  The same can be said for the trees outside of my window.  How do I know that there is a creator? Because I see the evidence in the mere fact that there is a creation.  If that logic wasn't enough for you then let's open up a Bible. Romans 1:20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. Psalms 19:1 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. These verses also state that God speaks to us through his creation.  So the entire universe around us is the proof that God exist and that he created it.

Now that we have established that God created everything let's take a look at His role in creating us.  Genesis 2:7 then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. God then created us, the human race out of the dust.  What is the significance of this?  All the rest of creation He spoke into existence but with us He took the time to form us and breathe His very breath into us thereby separating us from the rest of creation.  Why is this the case? Genesis 1:26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. God created us in His own image, and gave us authority over the rest of creation.  Then in Genesis 3 comes what is referred to as the fall of Man.  In trying to become like God, mankind ate fruit from the forbidden Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil thereby condemning mankind.  Why did this happen? It's a long story for another time but the short version is because God gave us free-will and because we are not God we use our free-will to make bad decisions.

God did not just create us and then turn us loose.  He has an individual plan for each and every one of us.  Jeremiah 1:5"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations." Now while these are God's words to Jeremiah that doesn't make it any less true for anyone today.  God loves us and has a plan for each us, but because of the free-will He gifted us with we must choose whether or not to accept that plan.  What is God's plan in your life? That you accept His gift of grace offered through the sacrifice of His Son so that we might be reconciled back to God despite our inherent sinful nature. Romans 5:10 For while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. After being reconciled back to God then we can further find His plans for us in His Word (the Bible).  But I can go ahead and tell you his overarching plan for all of us.  Matthew 28:18 And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.  And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age. God wants you to go and spread the Good News of his Son.  We who sinned against God are called to be reconciled to him so that we can go and spread the Gospel to all nations so that they might in turn be reconciled.  

Like I said earlier, we have been given free-will so that we might choose whether or not to follow God's plan for us.  He did this because He knows that in order for us to show our truest devotion to Him that we have to choose to give Him that devotion.  Do I know what God has specifically planned for your life? No. That's between you and Him.  But I do know that it is His will that all of his children be reconciled to Him (Romans 5:10) and to spread the good news of His grace to the whole world (Matthew 28:18-20).

The Perfect Word

Timothy 3:16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness 17 that the man of God may be equipped for every good work.

In order to properly understand the things that I will be addressing in later posts it is vital that you have a proper understanding of exactly what the Bible is and why it is important.  This will be a broad generalization when considering the purpose of the Bible and if anyone would like to know more about a certain aspect then feel free to send me a message or leave a comment and I will do what I can to address your question.  For example I am not going to break down the sections of the Bible and explain their purposes in this post; that is another post for another time.

The above verses from 1 Timothy 3 are excellent in explicitly stating the broad purposes of the Bible.  The first and most important thing to look at is the first few words, "All scripture is breathed out by God."  This states pretty clearly that all of the Scripture, which is the Bible, comes directly from God.  Was God the one that penned it out? No. But He did dictate it to the men who did, and they wrote exactly what He told them.  Some people may try to point out that because the Bible was penned by man that it is inherently faulty because man is faulty.  That type of thinking is faulty on two counts. The first count is that these were men of God.  They knew exactly who God is.  They knew that He is both all-knowing and all-powerful.   So you are going to try to sell me the fact that they were going to try to change God's word to suit their own purposes all the while knowing that one day they were going to have to give an account of their actions to God? Not gonna happen.  The second point goes back to the fact that God is all-knowing.  Do you really believe that God would make the mistake of choosing someone to pen out His will knowing that the man He chose would change it, therefore condemning future generations? That is also not happening.

Verse 16 of 1 Timothy 3 goes on to tell us what it is that scripture is to be used for and that is, "for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness."  Let's take a brief look at each of these items.  What is the Bible teaching? The Bible educates us as to who God is.  It shows us that God is specifically our Sovereign King, our Just Judge, our Loving Father, our Merciful Savior, and our Closest Friend.  These are several aspects of God that I will go into detail about at a later date but if you want to explore them yourself all you have to do is simply open up your Bible and start reading.  

Lets move on to reproof.  Dictionary.com states that reproof means, "the act of reproving, censuring, or rebuking."  The key word in that definition is rebuking.  The Bible is the means by which we can learn the difference between what is right and what is wrong (Exodus 20).  The Bible also tells us exactly what will happen to us if we do not change our sinful ways (Romans 6:23). This goes hand in hand with correction.  The Bible does not only expose us to what it is we shouldn't do but it also spends a great deal of time explaining the things that we should be doing along with the proper ways of doing them.  

Now for the interesting one, "training in righteousness." This is a combination of the first three things we talked about.  If we allow the Bible to teach us and discipline us then we are training to be righteous.  But here is the kicker.  We can't be righteous on our own merits no matter how much we try.  Romans 4 deals with this issue stating that if you put your whole faith in God, who sent His Son to die for our sins and raised him on the third day then it will be credited to you as righteousness.  Of course there is more to it than that but that is just an overview.  The point is the Bible trains us to be more righteous by helping us realize that the only way for that to be possible is by faith in the sacrifice of Jesus, the Son of God.

While verse 16 explains to us what the Bible is for, verse 17 explains to us why it is important.  Scripture should be the primary tool used when spreading the Gospel.  It contains everything we need to complete our mission.  That is why it is imperative that we as Christians must actively study it and learn from it.  The Bible is the Word of God.  Why should we try to use our own words when advancing or defending our faith when God gave us His own words? When we are trying to spread the Gospel we will be met with resistance because as stated in Ephesians 6:12, "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritually forces of evil in the heavenly places." A few verses later in Ephesians 6:17 after explaining the other parts that make up the Armor of God it explains to us what the Word of God is, " and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." The Bible is our primary weapon against the darkness because it is through the message that is contained in the Bible that will bring the lost into the light.  But as Christians we must be very cautious because the devil will try to use the Bible against us just as he tried to use the scriptures against Jesus in the desert during Jesus's period of temptation. (Matthew 4:1-11) How did Jesus defeat the devil? He used scripture.  People will pick out points in scripture to try to use against us but as long as we study and maintain a growing knowledge of what the Bible says we can use the Bible to defeat their attacks.

There is still so much that can be said about the Bible, but hopefully you now have a grasp of its importance.  The Bible is the primary tool God gave us to help with our spiritual growth so that we might better use His word to spread the Gospel.  Like anything else the more time you spend with the Bible the better you will know it and understand what it contains.  It is of the utmost importance that the Christian donates a healthy amount of time to studying and understanding the Bible, because a working knowledge of the Bible is essential in fulfilling our mission while not falling into the traps that are placed by the enemy.