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Chapter 4: The Bible
Key Verse:
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and
training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for
every good work.
2 Timothy 3:16-17 (NIV)
The word translated “God-breathed” (theopneustos) in the NIV is more commonly
translated “inspired,” which is less awkward but also less accurate. The term inspired
is much too broad in its common usage today to convey the force of the Greek
theopneustos, which is formed from theo (the root form of the word “God”) and
pneustos (from a Greek root having to do with breathing).
Modern translations offer “All Scripture is God-breathed” as the preferred rendering
of the text. It has been argued that the main point of verse 16 is the usefulness of
Scripture, not its inspiration. This is the logical direction of the text, but it is
important to note that the inspiration of Scripture is foundational to its usefulness.1
Questions:
 When you read “All Scripture is God-breathed,” what does that mean to you?
 What do you think about the quote “It has been argued that the main point of
verse 16 is the usefulness of Scripture, not its inspiration”?
1
https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/nivac-sample/2Tim.3.16-2Tim.3.17 (commentary is
developed using portions of this site).
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Scripture2
In thinking about our faith, we put primary reliance on the Bible. It’s the unique
testimony to God’s self-disclosure in the life of Israel; in the ministry, death, and
resurrection of Jesus the Christ; and in the Spirit’s work in the early church. It’s our
sacred canon and, thus, the decisive source of our Christian witness and the
authoritative measure of the truth in our beliefs.
In our theological journey we study the Bible within the believing community. Even
when we study it alone, we’re guided and corrected through dialogue with other
Christians. We interpret individual texts in light of their place in the Bible as a
whole. We use concordances, commentaries, and other aids prepared by the
scholars. With the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we try to discern both the original
intention of the text and its meaning for our own faith and life.
Questions:
 What truth is contained within Scripture?
 What version of the Bible do you use and why (e.g., New International
Version (NIV); New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), etc…)?
2
http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/reflecting-on-our-faith (Scripture)
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Our Christian Roots: The Bible3
We say that the Bible is vital to our faith and life, but what exactly is the Bible? Here
are four ways to view it:
A library
The Bible is a collection of sixty-six books, thirty-nine in the Old Testament (or
Hebrew Bible) and twenty-seven in the New Testament. These books were written
over a one-thousand-year period in three languages: Hebrew, Aramaic (the language
Jesus spoke), and Greek.
The books are of different lengths and different literary styles. In the Hebrew Bible
we find legends, histories, liturgies for community worship, songs, proverbs,
sermons, even a poetic drama (Job). In the New Testament are Gospels, a history,
many letters, and an apocalypse (Revelation). Yet through it all the Bible is the story
of the one God, who stands in a covenant relationship with the people of God.
Sacred Scripture
In early times and over many generations, the sixty-six books were thoughtfully used
by faithful people. In the process their merits were weighed, and the community of
believers finally gave them special authority. Tested by faith, proven by experience,
these books have become sacred; they've become our rule for faith and practice.
In Israel the Book of Deuteronomy was adopted as the Word of God about 621
B.C. The Torah, or Law (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible), assumed
authority around 400 B.C.; the Prophets about 200 B.C.; and the Writings about
100 B.C. After a struggle the Christians determined that the Hebrew Bible was
Scripture for them as well. The New Testament as we know it was formed and
adopted by church councils between A.D. 200 and A.D. 400.
God's Word
http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/our-christian-roots-the-bible (From United Methodist
Member's Handbook, Revised by George Koehler (Discipleship Resources, 2006), pp. 80-81.)
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We say that God speaks to us through the Bible, that it's God's Word. This authority
derives from three sources:
 We hold that the writers of the Bible were inspired, that they were filled with
God's Spirit as they wrote the truth to the best of their knowledge.
 We hold that God was at work in the process of canonization, during which
only the most faithful and useful books were adopted as Scripture.
 We hold that the Holy Spirit works today in our thoughtful study of the
Scriptures, especially as we study them together, seeking to relate the old
words to life's present realities.
The Bible's authority is, therefore, nothing magical. For example, we do not open
the text at random to discover God's will. The authority of Scripture derives from the
movement of God's Spirit in times past and in our reading of it today.
A guide to faith and life
We United Methodists put the Bible to work. In congregational worship we read
from the Bible. Through preaching, we interpret its message for our lives. It forms
the background of most of our hymns and liturgy. It's the foundation of our church
school curriculum. Many of us use it in our individual devotional lives, praying
through its implications day by day. However, we admit that there's still vast "biblical
illiteracy" in our denomination. We need to help one another open the Bible and
use it.
Perhaps the Bible is best put to use when we seriously answer these four questions
about a given text: (1) What did this passage mean to its original hearers? (2) What
part does it play in the Bible's total witness? (3) What does God seem to be saying to
my life, my community, my world, through this passage? and (4) What changes
should I consider making as a result of my study?
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Questions:
 Have you ever thought of the Bible as a library?
 What does it mean to you that certain books of the Bible were adopted as the
Word of God as early as 621 B.C.?
 Discuss the three different sources of God’s Word noted above. How do
these statements impact your understanding the Bible is the inspired Word of
God?
 The article above shared four different steps or questions that you need to ask
yourself when reading biblical texts. Have you tried one or all of these steps?
How do you best approach reading the Bible?
The following article was written by a United Methodist pastor on how the Bible is
not a book but a library. During the week or in class, read the article and
contemplate on what he is saying.
Questions:
 Based on the article, would you approach reading the Bible differently?
 Based on the article, does it confirm that the Bible is “inspired” and why?
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Chapter 4: The Bible
Commentary: Bible not a book but a library4
By the Rev. Talbot Davis
Aug. 4, 2014 | CHARLOTTE, N.C. (UMNS)
As one of my friends reminded me, I preached a lot last week.
Three times on one Sunday, followed by four nighttime sermons at the Pleasant
Grove Camp Meeting, followed by three times again the next Sunday. That is
actually more times than anyone should ever be allowed to hear the sound of his or
her voice in a given week.
But I did it. And before each of those 10 sermons, I gave some version of our
Good Shepherd United Methodist Church mantra: The Bible is not a book; it's a
library, a collection of books. We believe it's a library unlike any other library on
earth in that its words are God-breathed and therefore filled with eternity and truth.
So: I heard myself say that a lot. But in the aftermath of my preach-a-palooza, I
caught my breath and began thinking of some of the benefits of reading the Bible as
a library and not as a book.
There are many, but here are my top five:
1. You don’t read it consecutively. No one would ever go to the public library, find
the first book in the Dewey Decimal System and read through every book there
from the 000s to the 900s. That’s absurd even to contemplate. Yet that’s exactly
what we do with the Bible: open it to Genesis and figure we’re going to read all the
way through Revelation. Most folks are done by Leviticus. Such usage is completely
alien to the Bible’s composition and arrangement. Remember: The books in
Scripture were written at least 1,500 years before the printing press was even
invented, so the idea that they would be collected between two leather covers was
inconceivable to the authors.
2. You don't have to read it literally or symbolically. You read it literarily. In the
public library, you read the books in the auto mechanics section differently than you
do books in the poetry section. You read biographies differently than you read
4
http://www.umc.org/news-and-media/commentary-bible-not-a-book-but-a-library (Davis is pastor
of Good Shepherd United Methodist Church in Charlotte, N.C.)
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novels. You adjust your interpretation and understanding of those books according
to the type of writing they represent.
The books in the Bible are no different. When you understand types of literature,
for example, you realize that Genesis 1 is making no claims at measurable science; it
is instead making glorious claims about immeasurable theology, and doing so in the
form of a hymn. Turn to I Kings, however, and you're getting something else:
Israel's sordid, scandalous history, with all the warts exposed. And who knows? In
the elusive books of Job and Jonah, do we have the Bible’s section of novellas?
3. Figuring out literary types within Scripture is why it helps to read in community.
And by “in community,” I don’t mean solely with in church small groups, though
that is definitely the place to start. By “community” I also mean the collected
wisdom of the centuries as men and women have first studied the texts and then
written commentaries on them. If you feel you have an insight into a passage that no
one else has ever had before, it’s probably because your interpretation has been
considered previously and regarded as off the mark. Our biblical community has
both continuity and congruency.
4. Each book has its own authority. When you understand that Scripture is a library,
you are freed from the burden of harmonizing books that don't have much
harmony. You can allow each text to breathe its own truth. The book of Proverbs,
for example, contains some very different messages than the book of Ecclesiastes.
Don’t force agreement into a place where debate was likely intended. In the same
way, the Gospel of John is dramatically different in style and chronology than
Matthew, Mark and Luke; you rob John of its purpose and power when you try to
make it fit neatly within the framework of the other three. Let John be John … and
give him the authority to tell Jesus' story in his unique manner.
5. Speaking of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, the Bible’s biography section only
has one subject: Jesus. In this case, Scripture is the opposite of a public library. In
the library’s biography section, there are volumes on all kinds of people, from the
famous to the infamous. The Bible has four books in its biography section, but only
one subject: the One we know, appropriately enough, as the Word.
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Theological Guidelines: Scripture5
United Methodists share with other Christians the conviction that Scripture is the
primary source and criterion for Christian doctrine. Through Scripture the living
Christ meets us in the experience of redeeming grace. We are convinced that Jesus
Christ is the living Word of God in our midst whom we trust in life and death. The
biblical authors, illumined by the Holy Spirit, bear witness that in Christ the world is
reconciled to God. The Bible bears authentic testimony to God’s self-disclosure in
the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ as well as in God’s work of creation,
in the pilgrimage of Israel, and in the Holy Spirit’s ongoing activity in human history.
As we open our minds and hearts to the Word of God through the words of human
beings inspired by the Holy Spirit, faith is born and nourished, our understanding is
deepened, and the possibilities for transforming the world become apparent to us.
The Bible is sacred canon for Christian people, formally acknowledged as such by
historic ecumenical councils of the Church. Our doctrinal standards identify as
canonical thirty-nine books of the Old Testament and the twenty-seven books of the
New Testament.
Our standards affirm the Bible as the source of all that is “necessary” and “sufficient”
unto salvation (Articles of Religion) and “is to be received through the Holy Spirit as
the true rule and guide for faith and practice” (Confession of Faith).
We properly read Scripture within the believing community, informed by the
tradition of that community.
We interpret individual texts in light of their place in the Bible as a whole.
5
http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/theological-guidelines-scripture From "The Book of
Discipline of The United Methodist Church 2012." Copyright 2012 by The United Methodist
Publishing House.
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We are aided by scholarly inquiry and personal insight, under the guidance of the
Holy Spirit. As we work with each text, we take into account what we have been able
to learn about the original context and intention of that text. In this understanding we
draw upon the careful historical, literary, and textual studies of recent years, which
have enriched our understanding of the Bible.
Through this faithful reading of Scripture, we may come to know the truth of the
biblical message in its bearing on our own lives and the life of the world. Thus, the
Bible serves both as a source of our faith and as the basic criterion by which the
truth and fidelity of any interpretation of faith is measured.
While we acknowledge the primacy of Scripture in theological reflection, our
attempts to grasp its meaning always involve tradition, experience, and reason. Like
Scripture, these may become creative vehicles of the Holy Spirit as they function
within the Church. They quicken our faith, open our eyes to the wonder of God’s
love, and clarify our understanding.
The Wesleyan heritage, reflecting its origins in the catholic6 and reformed ethos of
English Christianity, directs us to a self-conscious use of these three sources in
interpreting Scripture and in formulating faith statements based on the biblical
witness. These sources are, along with Scripture, indispensable to our theological
task.
The close relationship of tradition, experience, and reason appears in the Bible
itself. Scripture witnesses to a variety of diverse traditions, some of which reflect
tensions in interpretation within the early Judeo-Christian heritage. However, these
traditions are woven together in the Bible in a manner that expresses the
fundamental unity of God’s revelation as received and experienced by people in the
diversity of their own lives.
6
universal
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The developing communities of faith judged them, therefore, to be an authoritative
witness to that revelation. In recognizing the interrelationship and inseparability of
the four basic resources for theological understanding, we are following a model that
is present in the biblical text itself.
Questions:
 Based on the Book of Discipline, how do you view the Bible?
 Based on the article, does it confirm that the Bible is “inspired” and why?
John Wesley placed emphasis on interpreting Scripture based on tradition,
experience, and reason. Read below to see how United Methodists today interpret
these three concepts. More information on these three concepts can be found on
the United Methodist website (www.umc.org).
Tradition7
Between the New Testament age and our own era stand countless witnesses on
whom we rely in our theological journey. Through their words in creed, hymn,
discourse, and prayer, through their music and art, through their courageous deeds,
we discover Christian insight by which our study of the Bible is illuminated. This
living tradition comes from many ages and many cultures. Even today Christians
living in far different circumstances from our own—in Africa, in Latin America, in
Asia—are helping us discover fresh understanding of the Gospel’s power.
Experience
A third source and criterion of our theology is our experience. By experience we
mean especially the “new life in Christ,” which is ours as a gift of God’s grace; such
rebirth and personal assurance gives us new eyes to see the living truth in Scripture.
But we mean also the broader experience of all the life we live, its joys, its hurts, its
7
http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/reflecting-on-our-faith
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yearnings. So we interpret the Bible in light of our cumulative experiences. We
interpret our life’s experience in light of the biblical message. We do so not only for
our experience individually but also for the experience of the whole human family.
Reason
Finally, our own careful use of reason, though not exactly a direct source of Christian
belief, is a necessary tool. We use our reason in reading and interpreting the
Scripture. We use it in relating the Scripture and tradition to our experience and in
organizing our theological witness in a way that’s internally coherent. We use our
reason in relating our beliefs to the full range of human knowledge and in expressing
our faith to others in clear and appealing ways.
Questions:
 Based on the concepts of tradition, experience and reason, how can you
better understand and/or explain biblical text?
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