Welcome to Day 1434 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Bible Study Requires Discipline – Meditation Monday

Wisdom - the final frontier to true knowledge. Welcome to Wisdom-Trek! Where our mission is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Hello, my friend, I am Guthrie Chamberlain, your captain on our journey to increase Wisdom and Create a Living Legacy. Thank you for joining us today as we explore wisdom on our 2nd millennium of podcasts. This is Day 1434 of our Trek, and it is time for Meditation Monday. Taking time to relax, refocus, and reprioritize our lives is crucial in order to create a living legacy. For you, it may just be time alone for quiet reflection. You may utilize structured meditation practices. In my life, Meditation includes reading and reflecting on God’s Word and in prayer. It is a time to renew my mind, refocus on what is most important, and making sure that I am nurturing my soul, mind, and body. As you come along with me on our trek each Meditation Monday, it is my hope and prayer that you, too, will experience a time for reflection and renewing of your mind. 

We are going to begin a new series this week on Meditation Monday, which will focus on Mastering Bible Study through a series of brief insights from Dr. Michael Heiser. Our first few insights will focus on study habits to build a strong foundation. Today let us meditate on:

Bible Study Requires Discipline

·      Insight Three: Bible Reading is not Bible Study

You should read your Bible. That’s obvious for Christians, and I’d dispense that piece of advice to anyone. But reading the Bible is not where our engagement with the Bible ends. It’s where it begins. You need to go beyond reading the Bible to a serious study of the Bible. The first step is to realize there’s a significant difference between reading and studying.

Reading is casual, something done for pleasure. The motivation is personal gratification or enrichment, not mastery of the content. Bible reading has as its aim private delight or personal application for our lives and relationship with God. Bible reading is inherently devotional and low maintenance.

Bible study, on the other hand, involves concentration and exertion. We have an intuitive sense that study requires some sort of method or technique and probably certain types of tools or aids. When we study the Bible, we’re asking questions, thinking about context, forming judgments, and looking for more information.

It’s not hard to illustrate the difference. Almost anyone can make a cup of coffee, but they’re not baristas. We know instinctively that both perform the same basic task, but what distinguishes the barista is a lot of time, effort, research, and experience in learned technique. It’s the same with Bible study.

Let’s try another coffee illustration. Let’s say you and your friend were from the moon and didn’t know what coffee was. You’re only mildly interested in the topic, so you decide to look it up in a dictionary. You read that coffee is ‘a popular beverage made from the roasted and pulverized seeds of a coffee plant. Good enough. You learned something. Your friend wants to know more —a lot more. How is coffee made? What’s the process? Is there more than one process? If so, why would there be different processes? Is there more than one kind of coffee bean? Where are the beans grown? Does that make any difference in color, aroma, or flavor? Is climate a consideration? How is coffee different than tea? If it’s a popular beverage, how much is consumed? Does consumption vary by country? State? Gender? Age? Whoa. She’s way over the top. And we know why. Her intensity of interest and willingness to expend effort tells us her aim is studying, not just reading. There’s a big difference, and it’s one that translates well to what we should do with the Bible.

·      Insight Four: Bible Study is a Discipline, Not a Ritual Event

Two of the hardest things about serious Bible study are getting started and then sustaining the effort. While a word like “sustaining” naturally speaks of regularity and continuity’, I’m not talking about treating Bible study like your morning routine. I’m not suggesting you make it part of a routine at all. If routine helps, then have a go at it. Being faithful at something doesn’t mean always doing it the same way or at the same time. All too often, spending time studying Scripture deteriorates into an item on a checklist to be dutifully checked off. “I’m devoted now.

Since Bible study is more than Bible reading; by definition, it involves thinking. Thinking is work. It’s not for sissies. If you re not mentally tired after doing what you presume is thinking, you aren’t really thinking. Sometimes our days don’t afford the time for the kind of sustained effort that goes into serious Bible study. Don’t let that bother you. Rather than fret over missing the study session you put on your checklist, my advice is to devote the small increments of time that you have to just thinking about what you’ve studied before. Sometimes it’s better to evaluate what you’ve taken in rather than taking in more. The point is this: It’s more spiritually productive to develop clarity on a point of the text or to figure out a way to frame a question for future study, than to just mark time with an open book (even if it’s the Bible) for the sake of maintaining a daily ritual. Ultimately, Bible study is about developing aptitude in the Scriptures, the source material for knowing God, not scorekeeping.

The life of the mind can be cultivated anywhere. You always bring your mind with you. Whatever you’ve been studying lately can be brought back and worked over again. Your brain has stored the fruits of your study. Precise recall isn’t a prerequisite either. Retrieve some thought and probe it for weakness, or thank God for its clarity. You’ll be surprised at how merely thinking from time to time helps you process a given issue or problem in altogether fresh ways.

Joshua 1:8

Study this Book of Instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night so you will be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do.

That is a wrap for today’s Meditation, next week; we will continue our trek on Meditation Monday as we take time to reflect on what is most important in creating our living legacy. On tomorrow’s trek, we will explore another wisdom quote. This 3-minute wisdom supplement will assist you in becoming healthy, wealthy, and wise each day. Thank you for joining me on this trek called life. Encourage your friends and family to join us and then come along tomorrow for another day of ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’ If you would like to listen to any of the past 1433 daily treks or read the daily journal, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com. I encourage you to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on your favorite podcast player so that each day will be downloaded to you automatically.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most importantly, I am your friend as I serve you through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal.

As we take this Trek of life together, let us always:

1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
2. Love Unconditionally
3. Listen Intentionally
4. Learn Continuously
5. Lend to others Generously
6. Lead with Integrity
7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain….reminding you to ’Keep Moving Forward,’ ‘Enjoy your Journey,’ and ‘Create a Great Day…Everyday’! See you tomorrow!