THE SETTING OF THE BIBLE AS EVIDENCE OF GOD'S WISDOM. There's at least one more way in which the setting of the Bible can serve to reveal God to us. Think for a minute about the God behind the strategic selection of the Mideast (Gen. 15:18; 17:8). The central platform and backdrop of Palestine speaks volumes about the wisdom and foresight of God.
Why do you suppose the Lord chose Palestine? Why didn't He give Egypt to Abraham? or Greece? or just let Abraham stay in Mesopotamia? Well, from a geographic standpoint we can see the strategic importance of this location.
1. Here, God could fulfill His promise to multiply Abraham's descendants (Gen. 12:1-3). The fertile plains, lush valleys, and rich hills of Palestine would turn that promise into a reality. So would the military location of Israel under David and Solomon.
2. Here, God could use Israel to influence the world powers commercially, militarily, and politically. Palestine was an ideal place for a witness to the peoples of both ancient and modern times. It stands at the place where three continents converge: Asia, Africa, and Europe. The caravan routes that passed through it were as important as the Persian Gulf is to supertankers today. Merchants, emissaries, generals, and traders, as they traveled through Palestine, noticed the devout ways and strict laws of the worshipers of Jehovah.
3. Here, God saw an ideal center for the spread of the gospel (Acts 1:8). The Lord commissioned His followers to a work of world evangelization. As the first witnesses for Christ went out from Jerusalem, using the excellent system of Roman roads and benefiting from a stable political environment, they were able to carry the gospel rapidly to Asia, Africa, and Europe.
Praise God for His inexpressible wisdom. He not only mercifully condescended to us, but He also determined exactly where and when He would meet and reveal Himself to us (Acts 17:26,27).
4. THE MOOD (EMOTION)
A fourth way we can know God through His Book is by looking for Him in the moods of the Bible. We are emotional beings, created in the image of a God who has made us to walk with Him not only with our minds, but also with our emotions. We have been created with the capacity to share God's joy and jealousy, pleasure and anger, love and hate. We get to know Him by believing that He is to be feared, loved, and praised, and by entering into those truths with our heart. We need to think through the Scripture to the point of feeling it. As we feel the moods of the Bible, our knowledge of God will grow.
LEARNING FROM LITERATURE. Mood is important to achieving the effect the author of a piece of literature intended. A feeling of desperation grows as we read Jack London's gripping story To Build a Fire. The setting is the Arctic. The character is a man caught in a blizzard. The story is a story of survival; if he cannot build a fire, he will die. As he struggles to ignite a flame, while the air becomes colder and colder, attempt after attempt fails. As he comes closer to the end, we feel his growing sense of frantic desperation. The mood almost overwhelms us.
THE MOODS OF THE BIBLE. When we take a bird's-eye view of the Bible, we observe two basic contrasting moods: despairing pessimism and hopeful optimism. They are both rooted in God's character and reflect whether man is responding to Him in obedience or disobedience.
DESPAIRING PESSIMISM. One of the prevailing moods of the Bible is that of sorrowful, despairing pessimism. It is there for those who refuse to come to God His way - through Jesus Christ. This mood, which every sensitive Christian feels when the Bible is read, is rooted in God's perfect justice. Just as He cannot lie or fail to keep His side of an agreement, so He cannot allow such things as slander, unthankfulness, adultery, or child abuse to go unpunished. If He did, He would violate His own nature. That's why, when you read the Bible, you can get depressed reading about the terrible things that happened when men, created for God, tried to live for themselves.
Don't you feel sympathy for Achan and his family when you read Joshua 7? Can you identify with David's feelings of alarm and frustration when God struck a man dead just because he tried to keep the ark of the covenant from falling off a cart? (2 Sam. 6:1-9).
Have you ever felt the mood of despairing pessimism that gripped Jeremiah and Ezekiel as they watched the downfall of the nation they loved? Have you felt the warm tears of Jeremiah as he cried like a brokenhearted mother or father? He knew that if Israel didn't repent they would be destroyed. Feel the mood of the situation as he cries out, "Oh, that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!" (Jer. 9:1).
You haven't really felt the mood of the stories in the Bible if you have never felt like Jeremiah did. God wants us to feel that way. Jesus, our perfect example, did. Think of Him with the tears running down His face as He thought about what was going to happen to the Jewish people because of their rejection of Him.
Why did God give us a Bible that produces such an oppressive mood of negative, unhappy feelings? Because He wants us to be like Him. He wants us to share the kind of compassion that allows Him to care when others bring pain and destruction on themselves and those they love. The thought should send shivers up our spine. Listen to God in Ezekiel 33:11, "Say to them, 'As I live,' says the Lord God, 'I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die . . . ?' "
Don't miss this fact. Reading the Bible should sometimes make you feel horrible. It should sometimes scare you. That's because its Author is right in His treatment of wrong. He must punish moral and spiritual rebellion just as any society must punish crimes of rape, embezzlement, or public drunkenness. He must do it even though He doesn't like to. He must abandon people to utter hopelessness even though it hurts Him to do so. Listen to Him as He, like a parent who must deal severely with a rebellious child, cries out to the Israelites, "O Ephraim, what shall I do to you? O Judah, what shall I do to you?" (Hos. 6:4). We don't really know God as we should until reading His Word causes us to feel the kind of hatred for pride, sexual violence, and marital unfaithfulness that God feels.
The following are examples of Bible passages that are designed to produce a mood of sorrowful, despairing pessimism: Joshua 7; 1 Samuel 4; Matthew 27:1-10; Acts 5.
HOPEFUL OPTIMISM. There is another mood that runs from Genesis to Revelation. This atmosphere also stems from God's character - His love, grace, and compassion. The psalmist declared, "The Lord takes pleasure in His people" (Ps. 149:4). The Proverbs repeatedly declare that God is delighted when people are honest, upright, truthful, and prayerful (Prov. 11:1,20; 12:22; 15:8; 16:13). Paul actually referred to the gospel as coming from "the blessed [happy] God" (1 Tim. 1:11). (The Greek word translated "blessed" here in most versions really means "happy.") If you want to see this happy, forgiving, loving side of God, read Psalm 103, John 3:16, and Romans 8. Yes, God is the God of hope. Paul prayed, "Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit" (Rom. 15:13).
This happy side of God should fill us with overwhelming joy. It should give us a positive, hope-filled attitude toward the future. Jesus Christ came. He lived a perfect life. He revealed God's love. He died for our sins. He conquered death. He saves all who put their trust in Him. He assures us that He is coming again to take us to be with Him forever. He tells us that the sorrows and sins and pains of this life will be replaced with the glory of living forever in His presence.
Yes, the Bible is a hopeful, optimistic book because its Author is a loving, compassionate, communicating, fellowshiping kind of God. He showed this side of His character when He sent His Son into the world with the assurance that everyone who trusted in Him would enjoy an inexpressibly wonderful eternity. That's the best news imaginable! It's good news to be celebrated! It's so good that it deserves a deeply emotional response of joy, gratitude, and praise. If we are not deeply moved by the Bible's story of hopeful optimism, we do not see or understand our God the way we should.
Examples of Bible passages that inspire a mood of joyful, hopeful optimism are Psalm 32; 42; 121; Daniel 6; Luke 18:35-43; 23:39-43; 2 Timothy 4:6-8. Remember that all of these Bible passages, even the words of the Psalms, relate to stories of real people.
5. THE MESSAGE
A fifth way we can know God through the Bible might be the most obvious. In this sense, the Bible is far more important to us than the U.S. Postal Service, Western Union, or Federal Express. The Bible is nothing less than the means God has chosen to communicate His thoughts and desires to us. The people of His Book and their stories are not there to entertain us. They are there so that we can know what God wants us to be and do.
LEARNING FROM LITERATURE. Once more we can learn from the world of books. The classics of literature - novels, plays, or poems - have often been a message from the writer to the reader. He wrote not just to entertain or to make money; he wrote because he had something important to say. The writer's job is to make that message clear; the reader's responsibility is to make sure he gets it.
Many of the novels of Charles Dickens, for example, were examples of social wrongs in England. The well-known Oliver Twist pointed out in popular terms the cruel conditions that orphans faced in 19th-century England. And even A Christmas Carol, with such powerful characters as Bob Cratchit, Ebenezer Scrooge, and the crippled Tiny Tim, called attention to the problems of low pay, long hours, and bad working conditions. Moreover, Dickens' message was: Let's do something to right these wrongs!
THE MESSAGE OF THE BIBLE. The message of the Bible is a call to action. Its message is to do what God wants us to do. Its basic, overarching message is to accept the rescue from eternal damnation that He has provided through the sacrificial death and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ. But there are many other messages in the Bible that call upon us to act. For example, God wants us to:
* tell the truth
* love one another
* confess and turn from our faults
* meditate on His Word
* pray for one another
* serve Him
* trust that what He says is true
Such messages might be found in the form of a direct command, but they are often found in an underlying principle.
For one example, let's find the message of the story about Daniel and his three prisoner-of-war friends in Daniel, chapter 1. Transported from their homeland to Babylon, they were selected by their captors as leadership material and enrolled into a kind of "officers' training school." As prime candidates of this foreign government, they were given the best of foods and drink. But there was one problem - much of this diet was forbidden by Jewish law. Daniel and his friends had to make a choice. Would they try to please their captors or God? We are told:
"But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king's delicacies, nor with the wine that he drank; therefore he requested of the chief of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself" (1:8).
Daniel's request was granted. God, in turn, honored these four men and blessed them with unusual physical health and academic ability. Daniel soon held a very influential governmental role.
What is the message? What is the principle that surfaces in this story? It is this: God wants us to remain faithful to Him no matter how difficult, frightening, or pagan the setting is. He expects this from His children and honors those who make the right choice.
This principle is based on truths we should know before we read this story: (1) God as our Maker and Sustainer has a right to demand first place in our lives; (2) He has the power and wisdom to bless those who honor Him; (3) He possesses the moral integrity to do what is right with us.
PUTTING IT TO WORK
We have said that a person can know God through the Bible by using five different points of view borrowed from the study of literature. Let's put it all together with one Bible story - the story of God testing Abraham's faith by telling him to sacrifice his son Isaac. Take a moment to read Genesis 22:1-14 and Hebrews 11:17-19. Then, apply the five points of view discussed in this booklet to the story.
1. THE STORY LINE: What God causes or allows to happen. God showed His power over nature by miraculously giving Abraham and Sarah a child long after her childbearing years. Later, however, God revealed that He not only had the power to give but the right to take away. When God told Abraham to do the unthinkable, to sacrifice Isaac, He exercised His sovereign authority. God forced Abraham to make a choice between faith or doubt, obedience or disobedience. When Abraham passed the test, God showed His ability to provide a last-minute provision and reversal of circumstances.
2. THE PEOPLE: What God looks for in His people. Abraham shows us that God looks for trusting obedience in His servants. Here was a man who chose God over his most dearly loved "pride and joy." As a result, God used Abraham as an example for a whole nation that followed.
3. THE PLACE: Where God rules. In this story we see that God is in control even on a remote wilderness mountaintop. God chose the desolate surroundings of Moriah as the physical backdrop for His spiritual business. It was in this place far from home that God chose to test Abraham's faith. Here, where there was no one else for Abraham to turn to, God revealed His own presence and ability to provide. Here, even the animals and the bushes met to serve Him. God later chose this location, rich with the significance of faith and His ability to provide, as a site for the temple.
4. THE MOOD: What God wants us to feel. The emotions of this real-life drama are intense. The mood, when properly felt, is enough to make a grown man cry. Here we find a God who chooses to arouse the deepest emotions of parental love. Yet, here we also find a God who doesn't want His children to succumb to the emotion of despair. Abraham's faith enabled him to rise above the deepest and most agonizing feelings. On the basis of his faith, he showed his ability to put his hope in God rather than in his circumstances. His agony turned to joy and to a renewed, deepened awareness of God's ability to provide.
5. THE MESSAGE: What God wants us to know and do. The message here is clear. God wants us to see His right to test and develop our faith. He wants us to choose Him over anyone or anything else. He wants us to choose obedience over disobedience. He wants us to pass such a test by relying on what He has said. He wants us to know that He is our ever-faithful Provider.
For Further Practice. Now, practice what you have learned by trying out this method of Bible study on the following stories: the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16), the incident at Ai (Josh. 7), the call of Isaiah (Is. 6:1-11), and the woman at the well (John 4).
HELPING YOU HELP OTHERS
The following questions are listed here for you to use in teaching or discipling others. We suggest that these questions be discussed prior to studying the specific point - as preview questions.
KNOWING GOD THROUGH THE STORY LINE
1. Do you agree or disagree with the premise that an author always says something about himself in what he writes?
2. Do you think that this premise is true of the Author of the Bible?
3. What would you say is the overall story line, or the big picture, of the Bible?
4. What does the story line of Joseph's life (Gen. 37-50) tell us about God?
KNOWING GOD THROUGH THE PEOPLE
1. Of what value is the study of biblical characters to a better understanding of God?
2. Who are some of the people of the Bible that you would describe as colorful and interesting?
3. Do you agree or disagree that God is looking for different things in us today than He was looking for in the people of the Bible?
4. What do the following passages about Moses' life tell us about God? (Ex. 3-4; 14; 32; Num. 12:3; 20:1-13).
KNOWING GOD THROUGH THE PLACES
1. Why is the setting important to a story?
2. What do the various settings of the Bible tell us about God? (e.g. military, agricultural, home, governmental, religious).
3. How can a well-rounded understanding of the settings of the Bible help us to avoid compartmentalizing God?
4. What does God's selection of the Mideast as the primary setting of the Bible tell us about God?
KNOWING GOD THROUGH THE MOOD
1. Do you think God wants us to feel emotion when we read His Word?
2. If you neglected to consider the mood of a particular Bible story, how would your understanding of that story be affected?
3. What would you say are the two primary moods of the Bible?
4. What mood is predominant in the account of the flood? of David and Goliath? of Ananias and Sapphira? What do these moods tell us about God?
KNOWING GOD THROUGH THE MESSAGE
1. What literary examples other than Scripture can you think of where the author used the story to get across a particular message?
2. What would you see as the main message of the Bible? How does this differ from the story line?
3. As you read the Bible, what are some principles that you would expect to see repeated over and over again in the various stories?
4. What is the underlying principle, or message, in the story of Daniel and his three friends? (Dan. 1).
WHAT ABOUT YOU?
How well do you know the God of the Bible? It's an important question, because the better we know God the better we will know ourselves. Furthermore, we will also be happier spiritually and in every other way.
To see God's holiness is to see our own sinfulness. To see His goodness is to know the wonder of His grace and the depth of His love for us. To see His majesty is to give Him the honor and praise He is worthy of.
Do you know God? Do you know Him better than you did a year ago? If you're a believer in Christ, your answer should be yes. The way to know God better is through His Word. As you read and study the Bible, you will grow. Perhaps you've been neglectful. If so, we hope that reading this booklet has challenged you to go back to the Bible and begin growing again.
If you don't know God, the first step is to establish a right relationship with Him. You do that by receiving Jesus Christ as your Savior, God's love-gift to you.
The facts are clear. All men are sinners (Rom. 3:23). Our sin keeps us from a right relationship with God, and we are powerless to do anything about it ourselves (Eph. 2:8,9). Salvation comes through Christ. He came to earth to die on the cross and pay the penalty for our sins. Now our responsibility is to trust in Him. Receive Christ as your Savior today. If you do, you'll have taken the first and most important step in knowing God.
