Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Speaker A: Welcome to the YA podcast. Lean in. As we dive into the practicals of life with Jesus as spirit filled young adults.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: All right, welcome back to some Bible chats. I am Thomas, and I'm with Sam. How you doing, Sam?
[00:00:33] Speaker A: Doing well.
[00:00:34] Speaker C: How are you doing?
[00:00:34] Speaker B: Yeah, doing well.
[00:00:35] Speaker C: Doing well.
[00:00:35] Speaker B: What are you reading in the Bible at the moment?
[00:00:38] Speaker A: Isaiah.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: Isaiah.
[00:00:40] Speaker C: Isaiah.
[00:00:40] Speaker B: Isaiah. Depends how you want to say it.
[00:00:43] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:00:43] Speaker B: Isaiah gospel.
[00:00:44] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah.
[00:00:45] Speaker B: That's what they call it.
[00:00:46] Speaker A: Really?
[00:00:47] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: Some people, because of how. I mean, one is because of how much it quotes. Is quoted in the gospel.
[00:00:52] Speaker C: It is. Yeah.
[00:00:52] Speaker B: But then also how much Jesus is.
[00:00:54] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:00:54] Speaker A: I feel like I'm always running into some scripture about the messiah, about Jesus that Jesus quoted as well.
[00:01:00] Speaker C: That's good. That's cool. Cool. What about you?
[00:01:02] Speaker B: I'm reading revelation.
[00:01:03] Speaker C: Of course you are. Yeah. I.
[00:01:06] Speaker B: Like, I was saying to Kelsey that I literally can't get out of revelation at the moment.
[00:01:12] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:01:12] Speaker B: Been sitting in, like, the letters to the churches a lot, and, you know, seven being the complete number for John and him. Like, this letter to the seven churches, when you read them all together, there's, like, this formula, like, each letter structured the exact same. And they all have very. You know, the ending is always to the one who conquers and things like that. And reading it more as.
Not just like, oh, this letter relates to where I'm at right now, but more as. Okay. As the letter to the seven churches, as holistically together.
The complete letter to the end Times church.
[00:01:53] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:01:54] Speaker B: So what do we learn from each of the seven that then can become almost like the letter to the end Times church, meaning us, because we're in the end times.
[00:02:05] Speaker C: Right.
[00:02:05] Speaker B: I mean, Paul and Peter said that they were the end times, so we're definitely end times, so, yeah, that's where I'm at.
[00:02:13] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:02:15] Speaker B: I love revelation.
[00:02:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:02:16] Speaker A: I'm not gonna lie. When I first read through the entire New Testament, I stopped just before revelation, but then I went back. I went back and I read it.
[00:02:24] Speaker B: And then you learned how to interpret the Bible, and it wasn't scary anymore.
[00:02:28] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:02:28] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:02:29] Speaker A: Awesome segue.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: Yeah. Thanks for that one. You handwrite that right to me. But, yeah, we're gonna talk about interpreting scripture. These episodes currently are very broad in looking at the Bible as in its entirety. What are some keys to reading the word of God that we have to keep in mind? We will eventually, in coming up episodes and whatnot, we'll pick out a scripture, and we'll start to read the scriptures and go through it together so that you can learn that way as well. But I think it's important as a primer to go, these are some things about the entirety of the Bible that we need to be aware of no matter where we're reading, what we're reading.
And so that's what we've been doing.
[00:03:10] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:03:10] Speaker A: And we'll obviously, like, probably be referring back to some of these principles as well as we go through specifically.
[00:03:16] Speaker B: Totally. And something I do want to say is, I think as we're talking about this, it can seem like we're saying, you know, when you read the Bible, you have to do in depth study every single time. And it's like, well, no, but, you know, a five minute quick look at, you know, what was the church in Ephesus facing? You do that every day. Um, that's a lot of study into the context of the Bible.
[00:03:39] Speaker C: Right. Yeah.
[00:03:39] Speaker B: And you pick it up along the way. Like, as you read the the epistle to Ephesus, the second time you read it, you don't have to do as much study. Maybe you look into something different. So I think we see it that that way of like, oh, my gosh, I have so much study to do, and it can feel like that. But you also have a lifetime. Yeah. And there, it's not negating even the different ways to read the Bible. There's more meditative, contemplative ways to read the Bible that I has have its place.
Have you done any of them before, Sam?
[00:04:12] Speaker A: Yeah, I've done, like, lecture divino?
[00:04:15] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:04:15] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:04:15] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:04:15] Speaker A: Yeah. I'm always terrible at describing it.
[00:04:18] Speaker C: Exactly.
[00:04:19] Speaker B: Maybe you can describe as in, like, dude. Yeah, it's like, yeah, it's more like you take a piece of scripture and you meditate on it. Yeah, like, it's very small passage.
[00:04:27] Speaker A: You take a very. Yeah, very small passage.
[00:04:29] Speaker B: And, I mean, for me, I was like, I love scripture, but on my, like, sabbath, it was starting to, like, really feel like a chore to read the Bible. So I got one of those alabastico Bibles that has, like, the pictures with scripture.
[00:04:43] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: And so I would read that slowly and just ponder on the. Ponder prayerfully on the pictures. And that changed how I read the Bible. It's very much not like who I am, but it was just that contrast. So we're not negating any of that. But when we read the scripture, in order to get an accurate viewpoint of how to apply it to our life, we do need to think about some things. So let's jump into that. But first, let's read the word of God, because it's important. Sam, can you read Hebrews 412?
[00:05:11] Speaker A: Yes, Hebrews 412. It says, for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
[00:05:28] Speaker B: Yeah, I love that scripture. It's one of the first that I memorized. And I was getting ready to preach one time, and the Lord started talking to me about people that had been hurt by scripture specifically. And he gave me a picture of a club versus a sword. And he said, some people have used my scriptures as a club to beat people with, rather than a sword to cut things off them.
[00:05:59] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:06:00] Speaker B: And both are painful, but one leaves us better off if we're cutting off the right things and the other leaves us beaded and bruised. The scripture shouldn't leave us beaten and bruised, but it definitely should cut things off us. Absolutely. And even in Hebrews 412, it talks about piercing to the division of soul and spirit. It divides rightly between what is of God and what is not.
And that's the cutting.
But when we misuse scripture, we can hurt people and we can beat them up and we can bruise them.
And just as anyone can pick up a club and use it as a weapon, but to use a sword as a weapon, you need training.
[00:06:47] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:06:48] Speaker B: You need to sharpen the sword. The sharper the sword, the less, um, the less painful the cuts will be.
[00:06:54] Speaker A: Yeah, the cleaner the cut.
[00:06:55] Speaker B: Yeah, totally. All that sort of thing. So I think that's an important place to start, is that we do need to be trained by the word.
[00:07:02] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:07:03] Speaker B: And we do need to be trained in the word. And so let's jump into that, I guess, talking about context, we want to contextualize scripture because that helps us to apply scripture accurately.
So what are some of these contexts?
[00:07:16] Speaker A: Yeah, we have three key ones. So first is the literary context.
[00:07:21] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:07:22] Speaker A: Second is historical context, and the third is the cultural context. And underneath that, we're going to talk about writer versus recipient context.
[00:07:32] Speaker B: Really good.
[00:07:32] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:07:33] Speaker B: And it's probably really good to say at this point, like, we want to talk about context because we're trying to glean from scripture, not put things into scripture. That's why we have to understand the context to which it was written, the time it was written, all those sorts of things, because scripture can never mean something to us that it didn't mean to them.
Scripture doesn't change meaning. We apply it differently, but the meaning doesn't change.
So that's important. That's why we need to contextualize it.
[00:08:07] Speaker C: Right. Yeah.
[00:08:09] Speaker B: Let's jump into literary context.
[00:08:11] Speaker A: Literary context, what does that mean? Yeah, well, there's a few things to consider here.
First of all, we can talk about the context of where it is in scripture. Okay. So, like, this particular verse, what book is it in?
[00:08:25] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:08:26] Speaker A: Okay. What chapter is it in?
[00:08:30] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:08:31] Speaker B: Like, even so, I guess what chapter meaning, like, you, epistles are probably the easiest to talk about when it's easy to see this and, you know, is it the first chapter? Well, that's going to be like an introduction, a thanksgiving, a prayer, that sort of stuff.
[00:08:43] Speaker A: And what is being talked about in general in this chapter or section as well, of scripture?
[00:08:49] Speaker B: That topic. The topic of it, yes.
[00:08:51] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah.
[00:08:51] Speaker A: The topic as well. Because you can easily take a scripture and make it mean anything you want. Oh, totally.
Because you've taken it completely out of the context, like, of the topic that they're talking about. You can apply it to any topic you want. And some things are. Can be applied to many, but they were written to be applied in a broader sense. Some things were written specifically to be applied in a specific context as well.
[00:09:17] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:09:18] Speaker A: And then also I thinking about as well, where that scripture sits in the entirety of the Bible as well, and how it relates to other scriptures in the Bible as well.
[00:09:28] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:09:28] Speaker B: Is it quoting another scripture or is it Old Testament, New Testament? That changes the way we interpret that and read that as well. As well as a genre.
[00:09:38] Speaker A: The genre, yeah.
[00:09:40] Speaker B: Changes a lot.
[00:09:41] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:09:43] Speaker B: The fact is, the way we read a historical narrative versus a prophetic book, like night and day.
[00:09:50] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah.
[00:09:51] Speaker B: Similarities.
But the way that we read them and the different literary devices and things to consider, like, recipients are completely different.
[00:10:03] Speaker A: So, yeah, I think just as an example as well, if you wanted to delve into one, like, I think we've talked about this before about how I always forget the scripture reference, but the one. The love chapter.
[00:10:15] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:10:15] Speaker B: First corinthians 13.
[00:10:16] Speaker C: There we go.
[00:10:17] Speaker A: Yeah. How, like, it's easy to take that love chapter and apply it to like, a marriage ceremony and stuff like that, but if we look at the context that it's written in, it's surrounded by scripture about prophecy and like, prophecy versus tongues and.
[00:10:33] Speaker B: Yeah, it's between spiritual gifts. Spiritual gifts, exactly.
[00:10:36] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:10:36] Speaker B: So it's between those two things, which is like, hey, you. And says, like, you gotta have love.
[00:10:41] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: Have love when you are doing these things.
[00:10:44] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:10:45] Speaker B: Because the problems that Corinth was facing when it came to spiritual gifts and that's why it was written in that. In that place.
[00:10:54] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:10:54] Speaker B: Changes the way you read first corinthians 13, right?
[00:10:56] Speaker A: Absolutely. It has almost this, like, chiastic kind of nature.
[00:11:00] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah.
[00:11:01] Speaker B: It's like.
[00:11:02] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:03] Speaker B: Like, we won't go too.
[00:11:05] Speaker A: I'll quickly just explain that. Just, like. Because, like, a chiasm is just, like. Like, a literary technique used a lot in the Bible and stuff like that, where, like, the center of a chiasm will be the. The key kind of point that is trying to be made there. So, like, uh.
[00:11:21] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:21] Speaker A: Like, they'll have, like, it could be a structure, like a, b, a, and b is the key thing that we need to keep at the center of that thing. And so you see that a little bit in that scripture as well, where love is being highlighted. Like, this needs to be the center of all of this.
[00:11:36] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:36] Speaker A: Just go off and start doing cool things with your spiritual gifts, but keep the center of it.
[00:11:41] Speaker B: It's love.
[00:11:41] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:42] Speaker B: Love for God and love for people. Do you want to know a funny story on that? When Kelsey and I got married, we said to the pastor who was marrying us, you are not allowed to preach first corinthians 13 at our wedding. I'm like, if you preach that, I'm done. I can't. And he didn't. He preached an incredible word. Loved it. It was awesome. But I was like, I'm sorry, I just can't. Like, I can't have one corinthians 13 in my wedding day. It just won't work. But, yeah, that's a perfect example of the literary context. Yeah. So the next one. Historical context. Anything about this one?
[00:12:17] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:18] Speaker A: So with that one, we're kind of referring to.
[00:12:20] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:21] Speaker A: What was happening at the time, events, people who are, like, you know, rulers, all that kind of stuff.
[00:12:28] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:28] Speaker A: What was going on in the context that it was written.
[00:12:32] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:32] Speaker B: I mean, like, for example, the Roman Empire was quite different under Emperor nero versus emperor Domitian.
[00:12:39] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:39] Speaker B: And knowing that is important for who was ruling when that person was writing that. And maybe that impacts on the reasons for some things they were saying.
[00:12:50] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Cause, like, if. Yeah, if you don't know what was going on, like, you can still probably glean a lot from it without knowing that specifically.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: Just opens it up.
[00:13:00] Speaker C: Right. But, yeah, yeah.
[00:13:01] Speaker A: It takes you a little bit deeper into the understanding of. Okay, so that is.
[00:13:05] Speaker C: Right.
[00:13:06] Speaker A: Why that is being written.
[00:13:07] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:13:08] Speaker A: Being said and all that kind of stuff.
[00:13:09] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:13:09] Speaker B: And even just knowing, like, oh, they're ruled by the Romans at that period of time, it matters. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's a pretty straightforward one. We understand that what's happening in history of that time, cultural context, probably a bit broader and something we need to consider more of what are kind of some things in cultural context.
[00:13:30] Speaker A: Yeah, I guess, like, yeah, more so to do.
[00:13:33] Speaker C: Like.
[00:13:33] Speaker A: So, like, for example, we have the epistles and stuff like that and written to certain churches at certain locations with their own kind of cultural context in terms of what was their society believes and their values and things like that and how they went about life as well and how that was affecting that body of believers and everything like that. And so then you find Paul and stuff like that, just writing into those specific cultural contexts as well, addressing certain issues that were relevant to them as well at the time.
[00:14:05] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:14:06] Speaker B: And even, like, why they potentially had those issues and why that was specific to them. And this is that whole idea of, like, it was written for us, but it wasn't written to us.
[00:14:15] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:14:16] Speaker B: And that's where we can. We can sometimes misapply. Scripture is when we try and take something that was written to a particular city, to a particular people group, to a problem that they were facing and we try and apply it to everything into every context.
And there's, there's no, there's like, why was that a problem there?
I mean, we weren't going to talk about this, but let's talk about first corinthians. Yeah, so one corinthians. Who was the writer?
[00:14:44] Speaker C: Paul. Yeah, ma'am.
[00:14:45] Speaker B: Not testing.
Was it novel?
[00:14:49] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:14:50] Speaker B: So, yeah, so Paul.
[00:14:52] Speaker C: Right.
[00:14:52] Speaker B: And obviously written to the church in Corinth, which was a, like, greek speaking place, hellenistic. And. But they were a center of, like, intellectual thought and they had a lot of greek orators, or orators who would come through and, you know, with the next greatest wisdom of philosophy and this and that, and they would be known. It was. They were judged by how eloquently they could speak.
[00:15:23] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:15:24] Speaker B: And this is why in one corinthians two, Paul says that I did not come to you with eloquent words of wisdom, but in a demonstration of power. He is not demeaning words of wisdom. He's not demeaning the way that we preach and the way that we speak. He is just saying he's actually putting himself against the ways of Corinth. Whereas I think sometimes we read that scripture like, oh, we don't need to preach, we just need to cast out demons and see healings. And I agree with that.
But he still preached. He's not saying he didn't preach. He's saying he didn't come, like the others, like the next greatest philosophy.
[00:16:01] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:02] Speaker B: But his demonstration of power was the witness to what he was preaching.
[00:16:07] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:08] Speaker A: Cause I think as well as human beings, it's like, simpler for us to just take something and just be able to, like, okay, I can apply that everywhere.
[00:16:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:16] Speaker B: Straight away.
[00:16:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:17] Speaker A: Because, like, then you don't have to think about, okay, what's the specific context of my situation and how that principle, rather than just a rule, applies to me in my context and all that kind of stuff.
So, yeah, we find ourselves just trying to simplify everything in our minds just to be like, that's a rule, that's a rule. You can't do this, you can do that, all that kind of stuff.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: And even so, if we want to go into that a bit more about maybe the recipient's context in Corinthians. Right. And let's use chapters 1213 and 14.
Do you know some of the problems that they. That Paul was addressing in the church?
[00:16:50] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:51] Speaker A: Because we're talking about, like, the use of the spiritual gifts.
[00:16:55] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:55] Speaker A: Kind of stuff in the church.
[00:16:56] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:57] Speaker A: Well, I think from my understanding as well that there was, like, there was no order to it as well in terms of the way prophecies were given, all that kind of stuff and all that kind of thing. And also what they were putting value on, that everyone was just speaking in tongues, whatever. And no one was necessarily translating, no one was doing these types of things. And so there was potentially confusion in the church.
[00:17:17] Speaker B: Yeah, totally. And it's even, you know, Paul has to redirect in chapter 13 about love for others. That's the primary motivator.
[00:17:27] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:17:27] Speaker B: Because the reason why there was chaos, the reason why everyone was just, like, speaking in tongues whenever they wanted to and doing whatever they could, and it was. There was no order was because they were motivated, motivated by self and not motivated out of love. So it was, how can I show myself to be spiritually elite? Speaking in tongues is my spiritual elitism.
Whereas, no, it's about building myself up so that I can minister to people or prophecy is showing myself off. It's like, no, no, prophecy is revealing the heart of the father to that person. So it's motivated by love rather than motivated by self. And that was the biggest problem in Corinth.
[00:18:07] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:18:08] Speaker B: Was selfish motivation.
[00:18:10] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:18:10] Speaker A: And not to say as well that there was no place for tongues because that some ways people interpret it as well, because that's affirmed as well.
[00:18:19] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:18:19] Speaker A: That is for self edification and stuff like that. And that means, yeah, we can speak in tongues, but, like, you're not gonna prophesy in tongues over someone else because that's not.
[00:18:28] Speaker B: Without interpreter.
[00:18:29] Speaker A: Without an interpreter. Yeah, because that's not you being loving to that person because they don't know what's going on.
[00:18:35] Speaker B: Praying in tongues to build myself up is different. Different application. And even, you know, the response to improper use isn't no use. Yeah, it's correct use.
[00:18:47] Speaker C: Exactly.
[00:18:48] Speaker B: And that's across all spiritual giftings, I think. You know, we often talk about tongues and those sorts in prophecy, but, like, it's all spiritual gifts. Yeah. And that's. See, this problem of self is all through one corinthians. Yeah. Because later on in one corinthians, they come to the issue of communion and how some would bring. It was communion was a meal for them, and they would bring all their food, and some were getting drunk, some were getting full off the communion meal. Yeah.
This is meant to be glorifying Jesus.
[00:19:22] Speaker C: Right? Yeah.
[00:19:22] Speaker B: And some were not waiting for people to come. They were just starting to eat their food. And so some would come with no food and go home hungry. Others would go home eating way too much food. And Paul's like, what are you guys doing? This has nothing to do with the communion meal that was set before you, and that was actually that Jesus had intended for us. And again, it's that self. So once you understand that context, now, this is that cultural context, we come to realize why Paul's talking about what he's talking about.
And, you know, why, how we can then apply it. Now, I don't know about you, but our communion meal is a wafer and a bit of juice, not enough juice to even wet your tongue.
So we probably don't have the same issue when it comes to communion. Right. And so we're not going to apply it in the same way.
[00:20:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:16] Speaker B: But the issue with self, we got that problem.
[00:20:20] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:20:21] Speaker C: Gosh.
[00:20:22] Speaker B: So we can apply that.
So, yeah. Context is really, really key there.
[00:20:27] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:28] Speaker B: Do you have anything to add?
[00:20:29] Speaker A: No, I guess just a question.
[00:20:31] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: Like, so now, when we're thinking about these contexts and everything, like, what are some practical questions we can be asking ourselves?
[00:20:37] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:38] Speaker A: When we look at a scripture.
[00:20:39] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:20:40] Speaker B: Those who what, when kind of questions. So who's writing?
Who's receiving?
Where are they? When are they? Which is a funny question to ask.
What is the issue being addressed and how is that issue brought up? So in one corinthians, Paul says, I received a letter from one of. From Chloe's household. Like, I know you can't lie about this. I know I received a letter. So it's like, oh, okay, cool. So he has information about the problems that they're facing. Yeah. So, yeah, so what's the issue he's addressing, and what's the genre?
What do I need to know about this genre? If it's a poem that's different, epistle, that sort of stuff?
And, yeah, those are the main probable questions that I would be asking and answering. Those questions are really quite easy.
A lot of the answers are actually in scripture.
[00:21:39] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:21:40] Speaker B: Like, I think it's something you don't have to go outside scripture for a lot of this. Everything that we just spoke about in one corinthians, you can find in one corinthians.
I don't have to go outside now, going outside of scripture into biblical encyclopedias and those sort of things. Helpful, but you don't have to. You can get a long way with scripture if you know what you're looking for. So, yeah, there's some questions. Who's writing? Who's receiving? What's the issues that they're talking about? Where is this in scripture and what's the genre? Those are the main ones that you probably come across every time you're reading.
[00:22:14] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.
[00:22:16] Speaker B: Cool. So that's some stuff about contextualizing scripture, and I love it. Scripture comes to life when you actually contextualize it and when you start to deepen your understanding of that context behind it. So, yeah, that's all things context and reading scripture. So it's been a pleasure to be talking the Bible with you guys. Hope that it has blessed you, and we'd love to hear any questions that you have that come out of this, because we are going to be doing a Q and a episode. So if you do have questions in that, we'll come back to them in that episode sometime soon. So love you all, and have a good time.
[00:22:51] Speaker C: See you guys. Bye.
