Page 17 - Bible Study Methods-Textbook_Neat

Think of how Jesus encouraged Peter after his betrayal. This is the ministry of the Spirit of Christ to build
us up so that He might fill and use us.

Finally, God’s Word trains us. What God does is combine life events and instruction to bring about
changes in our lives which will make us more like Christ. The Spirit of God carefully uses the Word of
God to train us to rightly live in relationship to others. God does not just teach us to know that we
should have a good marriage but trains us to have a good one.

The word (paideia) used here for training is the same general word used for the way parents train their
children. This word includes in it the sense of chastisement along with positive instruction.

The purpose for God’s Word through all of this is to produce in us righteousness and to make us
adequate servants of Christ. It all comes through the process of our willingness to read and digest the
Bible.

God holds teachers to a higher standard.

James 3:1 Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such
we will incur a stricter judgment.

It’s one thing to read the Bible for yourself and to personally study God’s Word. But
the moment you begin to tell someone else what the Bible is saying, God says you
are moving to a new level of responsibility and are STRONGLY cautioned. You will stand before God and
give an account of the words you share. And if you teach someone else and misapply God’s Word, you
have altered the Bible and will be held accountable before God for your errors. So, before you take on a
position of teaching or preaching God’s Word, you had better know for a fact that what you are telling
others is really what God wrote in His book.

While given as a warning to those who read the book of Revelation, chapter 22 gives grave warnings
about adding to or subtracting from the book. The consequences are huge.

Rev. 22: 18-19 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll: If anyone adds
anything to them, God will add to that person the plagues described in this scroll. And if anyone takes
words away from this scroll of prophecy, God will take away from that person any share in the tree of life
and in the Holy City, which are described in this scroll.

Here is what God expects of those who want to teach:

II Timothy 3:15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be
ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth.

In some translations, the words “accurately handling” are translated, “rightly
dividing”. According to Dr. Paul Elliott, the Greek word used is orthotomeo. In New
Testament times, orthotomeo was primarily a civil engineering term. It was used, for
example, as a road building term. The idea of the word was to cut straight, or to guide
on a straight path. The idea is to cut a roadway in a straight manner so that people
who will travel over that road can arrive at their destination directly, without
deviation.

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