How to Read the Bible – A Three Step Plan (written for Catholics - valid for all)

taylormarshall.com ^ | September 30, 2013 | Dr. Taylor Marshall

[NYer]

How do you read the Bible? Today is the feast day of Saint Jerome, who once quipped, “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.”

“Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” – Saint Jerome

It’s a running joke that if you want to find a Bible verse, you ought to ask a Protestant and not a Catholic. Protestants read the Bible. Catholics not so much.

This raises the question:

Why Don’t More Catholics Read the Bible?

I think the answer lies in the fact that we Catholics go to Mass. The Holy Mass has at least two Bible readings every time. If you pray the Breviary or Liturgy of Hours, multiply that several times.

Joe Catholic says to himself, “Why should I study the Bible? I go to Mass. I hear it there. Check and check.”

There is something beautiful in this. For Catholics, Bible reading is liturgical. Hence, Bible reading remains chiefly a community experience.

Three Step Plan to Kick It Up a Notch

It’s good to listen to the readings from the Bible at Holy Mass. However, we also need a personal (even private) encounter with God in the pages of Sacred Scripture. All of the saints breathed Sacred Scripture. Scripture served as the grammar for their souls. They couldn’t communicate without it.

Here are some basic spiritual needs that you have every single day of your life:

1. Praise – Voicing your delight in God and His provision for your life. Gratitude destroys discouragement.
2. Wisdom – You need practical advice to navigate the complexities of life.
3. Challenge – You need to be lifted higher. You need to grow in your faith. You need to be inspired. You must be an intentional Christian.

So when you wake up tomorrow, do the following:

1. Read a Psalm. Start with Psalm 1. Make it your anthem of praise for that day.
2. Read at least one Proverb. Proverbs are the wisdom morsels of your day. There are 31 chapters. Why not read one chapter every day during the month. Oct 1 is Provers 1. October 31 is Proverbs 31. You get the idea.
3. Read a chapter of the one of the Gospels. This is your challenge. Your Savior challenges you in the four Gospels. He calls you to be not merely a nominal Catholic but a disciple. You cannot seriously read the Gospels and stay lukewarm. Christ speaks in a way that cannot be ignored.

“But I’m so busy. I don’t have the time!”

What? You’re too busy. Sorry, you just got served a yellow card:

That’s a yellow card. You’ve been warned…

Doing these three readings will take you only 3-5 minutes. That’s the time of a commercial break. It will change your life for good. I promise. It takes 21 days to make a habit, so give it 21 days and see if you aren’t hooked. Put the Bible on your night stand and read it in the mornings. Start fresh.

“Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” – Saint Jerome, Doctor of the Church

[HiTech RedNeck]

The big question here is the manner, if any, in which communication between sinless saint in perfect heaven and fallen sinner in decaying creation can and does occur.

Crazy Evangelicals like me don’t lean on the bible just out of a whim. No other Christian spiritual work is on the same caliber as the Bible. Alleged later Christian spiritual works (that are not direct derivations of the bible) center on men, not on God, while alleging God, far from displaying His glory, to take a modest powder. That’s the facts and I’m sticken to them, Jack.

Anyhow... the biblical circumstances for this are narrow. The Transfiguration is the only occasion documented for appearance of a saint that had not actually been resurrected. The saints there were accompanied by Jesus to appear. How often does such accompaniment occur in Catholic lore?

[terycarl]

Not if you're in the Catholic Church, or a bomb shelter, or a tornado shelter..... LOL... Or perhaps a septic tank...

I don't recall mentioning a pro......er....false religion.

[HiTech RedNeck]

The RCC has gotten full of itself.

That doesn’t mean Christ can’t operate there (I flatly reject any allegation that He can’t or doesn’t), but He operates against difficulties.

The difficulties He faces in evangelical Christendom are discussed less among evangelicals.

A true portable Christianity will not be partial to any worship community but will see Christ ministering in all (as long as He is ministering at all) and yet not partake of that community’s errors.

[Iscool]

That doesn’t mean Christ can’t operate there (I flatly reject any allegation that He can’t or doesn’t), but He operates against difficulties.

I didn't say he didn't...In fact there are many former Catholics here who will attest to the fact that Jesus operates in the Catholic religion...

Rev 18:4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.

2Co 6:14 Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
2Co 6:15 And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?

Many former Catholics have heeded these warnings...

And I have no doubt that there are Christians in the Catholic religion...I believe they too would leave except it be for wars in family relationships, old folks who wouldn't know how to leave a life long institution and for any number of reasons...

I hope you are not suggesting that Jesus plays along in their rituals...

[boatbums]

since you, nor anyone else on Earth, knows the exact date when Christ appointed Peter to head His church....why not accept my guess as accurate as any other ???

For the same reason I already stated...If you cannot be honest about the little details tell me why should you be trusted with the big ones? There is a LOT of stuff in Roman Catholicism that others are expected to just accept what has been guessed at or imagined and is far from a "guess as accurate as any other". We don't base our eternal destiny on the things that can be only guessed at. The stuff that can be proved from Holy Scripture, I have no problem with and I DO accept by faith because GOD said it. When the RCC holds to those same doctrines, we can agree. Where they swerve off into guesswork, wishful thinking or assumptions - especially when these are contrary to Scripture - then we should trust in Scripture rather than the proclamations of fallible men - no matter how high up they claim to be.

[boatbums]

You can’t be baptised twice if your baptism was a trinitarian baptism. So if you were baptised into the Catholic faith and you have fallen out of the Catholic faith, all you have to do to get back into the Catholic faith is go to Confession. In a nutshell that’s what I meant.

I was baptized twice. The first time was as a baby without my knowledge, consent or personal expression of faith. The second time was what I believe was the ONLY time that counted and it was after I came to saving faith in Jesus Christ. When I understood that He died for me and by believing in Him I would never perish or be snatched from His hands. I know people who were baptized as babies in the RCC and they couldn't be further from Christ had they been raised all their lives with atheists. The ACT of water baptism is supposed to be done AFTER one receives Jesus Christ and makes a personal decision to follow Him in newness of life. It is an outward sign to others of the faith work on the inside. The "act" is not what saves us - it is the faith in Christ's finished work that does that.

[boatbums]

see:American revolution...didn't change England one iota...just launched a different version of government...

Didn't change England one iota??? Tell me, do they now have elections in the UK? Does the king or queen still hold sovereign power over all the kingdom? I'd say the American revolution changed the entire WORLD!

What Luther did - and he was hardly alone in the Reformation (which began before he was even born) - DID cause changes in the RCC. On many things they admitted error and evolved to what it is today. The Pope at the time and his successor were too proud to give credit to the Reformers for their efforts to restore the Christian faith as it was originally followed by the early church. They, instead, persecuted and hunted down for slaughter those who DARED rise up to defend the orthodox Christian faith. I'd say Catholics should be saying THANK YOU to the Reformation! They should also be actively participating in continuing to reform their church until Christ returns to be more like that which the Apostles through the Holy Spirit began.

[Elsie]

since you, nor anyone else on Earth, knows the exact date when Christ appointed Peter to head His church....why not accept my guess as accurate as any other ???

since you, nor anyone else on Earth, knows the exact date that Mary died and where she was buried....why not accept the RCC claim as accurate as any other ???

[Elsie]

...one must always remember his/her fifth grade english class where we learned to diagram a sentence in order to learn its' true meaning...

And, after that, you must 'remember' just what the THIS was, that Jesus was talking about: a yearly REMEMBERANCE meal of GOD's saving mercy from bondage to the Egyptians.

---

What Most of Christianity has done to this MEAL is indescribeable.

[Elsie]

...again your diatribe on the few bad Popes...

Ha ha ha!

My posting facts about the HISTORICAL shame of the 'church's horrible selection process is a DIATRIBE!

Who knew!!

I guess I should post something showing my obsession with a revolting old catholic priest instead: one who had the BAL... temerity to stand up to the MIGHTY Religious Organization who would KILL anyone that disagreed with it!

[Elsie]

.....by the way, there was no one else in the world who would have done it....we had to do it ourselves.....

Yeah... thanks indeed; for the COUNTER reformation.

[Elsie]

I might win....you never will.

Poor thing; trying to justify your poor mathematical choice with MY fact that I'll NEVER lose!

[Elsie]

as an aside I know a man who won 1 million

But; what you DON'T know is the names of MORE THAN 2 million LOSERS who paid a dollar for that 'lucky' man could 'win' a $1,000,000.

And, after the lovely various gummints gets done with his 'winnings' he'd be LUCKY to have half of it left!

[Elsie]

...as an aside I know a man who won 1 million...

But; what you DON'T know are the names of MORE THAN 2 million LOSERS who paid a dollar so that 'lucky' man could 'win' a $1,000,000.

And, after the various lovely gummints gets done with his 'winnings' he'd be LUCKY to have half of it left!

[Elsie]

Here ya go!

IMPROVE your chances!!

Put together by an OBVIOUS brainy math major!!!

http://www.smartluck.com/free-lottery-tips/indiana-hoosier-lotto-648.htm

[Elsie]

Christianity would be in far better shape if they had....sigh, oh well, next time

Ah... the DNA appears!

[Elsie]

Then use them!

[Elsie]

...you never convert a Catholic into something lesser.

True.

Just smarter...

[Elsie]

didn't change England one iota...

HA ha...

I guess Luther didn't 'change' the evils of the RCC; either.

[Elsie]

Finally; you are admitting that the RCC has had some, shall we say, problems in the past.

(and some in the NOT so distance past, as well some ongoing problems even as we speak.)