The Value of Bible Study

by Ken Pullen

ACP

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

I believe the value of Bible study comes down to choosing life or death.

Life or death of one’s eternal spirit and soul. Literally a life sentence, or a death sentence, depending on belief, faith, practice, pursuit, and devotion of a burning heart towards the Lord our God, our Lord the Son of God, and God living and indwelling, the Holy Spirit.

To refuse the life-giving water, the life-giving truth of God’s Word is death. We either have faith and believe, and then fervently, daily, spend time with our faces in God’s Word while on bended knee, or in humble prayer, studying, seeking, asking God to give us understanding of His will, His Word so we may grow closer to Him, so we may put on the full armor of the Word of God and make ourselves ready. Or we don’t. We refuse the Word of God. We choose either life or death. And the Word of God is the heart of the matter.

To study the Bible is gain. The Word of God contains more wealth than all the treasure of the world. The word of God contains the Fountain of Life almost all have sought since the creation of man. To shun the Bible, or to study amiss – following the dripping, beguiling, satisfying words of false teachers, without examining those words against the Truth of the Holy Scriptures, in an approved translation, such as the King James Bible – is loss. Loss of life. Loss of wisdom. Loss of the greatest treasure a person can come across in their lifetime. Loss of discernment and true growth – the growth of spirit.

Far too few are laying down a rock solid foundation of Bible study for their children. Every excuse is made – even among the professed believer of our times, in these times of great apostasy. In these times of growing false teachings and false teachers, and in these times of perverted translations of God’s Word to suit the ways of men rather than print the truth of God! Too few professed believers are putting any amount of time, prayer, or study into the living, inerrant Word of God. The foundation of life, the fountain of living water providing true clarity, refreshment, invigoration, and eternal life.

It is my hope and prayer unto the Lord our God, Jehovah Elyon, and Yeshua, Jesus Christ my Lord, that all professing to believe turn to the Word of God upon their knees in humility asking the Holy Spirit to give them discernment and understanding. Not of men, not from men – but from the Holy Spirit Himself!

And that each renews their study DAILY and teaches their children well – for the time is short and the fields are ripe for the harvest.

Here’s an idea; rather than everyone in the family eating on the run, eating by themselves from a microwave, how about families coming together to eat supper? And at the end of dinner the head of the household take a King James Version Bible, and prays unto God, while all members of the family are seated and near, asking that the Lord would provide them the ears to hear, the hearts to take in the truth of His Word. And then the head of the household would read aloud from the Word of God. After every meal.

Try it.

All will receive more from such daily experience than running in all directions, checking their mobile phones, texting, or turning up the volume on “Entertainment Tonight” to waste time listening to what some celebrity is doing.

Don’t waste any time. We all have less than we had yesterday and each day we grow closer to the end. Take the time now, while it is given, to study to be approved, to rightly discern the Word of God, and to provide and build upon a Rock solid foundation for yourself and those you love.

The Value Of Bible Study

by Pastor Cornelius R. Stam

“From a child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus” (II Tim. 3:15).

Timothy was a fortunate young man. His father was not a believer in Christ, but his godly mother made up for this lack as, day after day, from his earliest childhood, she taught him the Word of God. As a result he came to know Christ at an early age and later became St. Paul’s faithful co-worker and close associate in making known the wonderful “good news of the grace of God.”

In his very last letter the great Apostle Paul recalls Timothy’s“unfeigned faith… which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice”(II Tim. 1:5).

If only we had more such mothers and grandmothers today, with husbands to help them! If only our American children were not set adrift on a restless sea of human speculation, but were taught the eternal truths of God’s Word, the Bible!

We all need to “know the Holy Scriptures,” not only because they teach reverence for God and build moral character, but most of all because they “are able to make [us] wise unto salvation through faith… in Christ Jesus.”

The theme of the Bible, the Old Testament as well as New, is the Lord Jesus Christ, the riches of whose saving grace are unfolded to us in the Epistles of Paul, the chief of sinners saved by grace. It was to Paul that God committed the preaching of the cross of Christ. He it is who tells us about the riches that flow from Calvary. He it is who tells us, by divine inspiration that:

“…WE HAVE REDEMPTION THROUGH [CHRIST’S] BLOOD, THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS ACCORDING TO THE RICHES OF HIS GRACE” (Eph. 1:7).

“THAT IN THE AGES TO COME HE MIGHT SHOW THE EXCEEDING RICHES OF HIS GRACE IN HIS KINDNESS TOWARD US THROUGH CHRIST JESUS” (Eph. 2:7).