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

[boatbums]

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.

that is almost a perfect description of what the Sacrament of Confirmation....Confirmation is a Sacrament through which the Holy Spirit comes to us, in a special way, to enable us to profess our faith as strong and perfect Christians and soldiers of Jesus Christ.

That demonstrates how far away from the true faith the Roman Catholic Church has come. They substituted one thing for another and negated what the first was meant to be.

[terycarl]

You just contradicted yourself. If you are baptized Catholic, by wearing that label, you ARE baptized into a denomination.

Wrong again Kemosabe....Catholicism is Christianity....when various groups decided to go their own ways, they needed to be named (hence denomination)...the Catholics remained Catholics, the others became...whatever denomination, Lutheran, Methodist, Baptist, church of the Nazerine, foursquare church of God, whatever....needed names, hence....denominations. Catholics remain Catholics!

[aMorePerfectUnion]

History shows the accretion of pagan beliefs and practices into the roman church.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“Nobody in the group you identify with can claim they EVER had any authority to “determine” what was from God. “

Oh sure they did under guidance from God - back before Roman Catholicism began and there were just Christians. God inspired it, moved men, preserved it, etc. ALL Him.

Today more importantly, we already have it.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

He commanded them to share bread and wine as a symbolic partaking in his memory. We do. We just reject the magic thinking that arose much later.

[terycarl]

At the end of the day, the cover-up of your molesting priests by the church was worse that the molesting

to the outsider it was, to the victim it isn't even close...now let's get back to solving the problem...recognize it, try to compensate victims for it, eliminate the causes for it...whatever...the Catholic church has done all of these, the Protestant community, while shielding FAR more offenders has done basically NOTHING!

[boatbums]

for you to even suggest that the protestant revolution was a work of God is to say that the halocaust(sic) was too... just because they happened, doesn't mean that God was happy with them......He wasn't.

Comparing the Reformation to the Holocaust now??? Isn't there some internet "rule" about that? It sure sounds like God was happy with it since He continued to save those who came to Him in faith APART from the Roman Catholic Church. You can continue to believe in the myths your church spins around what really happened and the rest of us will continue on in the winning of souls to Christ, living lives that glorify and honor Him.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“
Nope, the Catholic church was given the gift of Infallibility (a necessary gift, by the way)by Christ Himself. While it is certainly my opinion, it is shared by literally billions of Christians over the past 2,013 years.....billions!!”

At least you admit is simply an opinion. That’s a start.

As to billions, that counts everyone (80%) who do not practice catholicism... So who knows what they believe...

[boatbums]

What happened, couldn’t read far enough along to see the statements of many church fathers going back then???

[aMorePerfectUnion]

You sure like to try to change the subject!

You say all that , but my church has no instances of molestation or coverup. To even be a volunteer there, you have to pass a police background check.

[terycarl]

We are to share bead and wine in memory of His actual sacrifice - as He said

that's not what He said at all, and the Christian church has NEVER taught that until the revolution, when people appeared who just weren't strong enough to believe that Christ would have actually given of HIMSELF rather than a hunk of bread for our benefit.

[Religion Moderator]

Discuss the issues all you want, but do not make it personal.

[boatbums]

sure there were, while they did not YET claim the title of Catholic, we all know that they shortly became known as Catholic....so it was retroactice for s few years, same people, same scripture, same teaching same everything to this date....one should stop trying to deny reality...get over it....it happened and there's nothing anyone can do to change it....you can deny it all you want, but history cannot be changed.

Retroactive??? There are a LOT of things your church claims are retroactive. Too bad that they couldn't actually go back and change everything like the character Winston Smith in the novel 1984 who worked for the Ministry of Truth (Minitrue), which is responsible for propaganda and historical revisionism. His job is to re-write past newspaper articles so that the historical record always supports the current party line. Now, I wonder where Orwell got that idea?

[terycarl]

The ONLY baptism that “counts’ is the one where the baptizee has made a public profession of faith and God, who sees the heart, knows who are His.

if you're going to interpret what a valid baptism is, snd what it does....you should belong to the church that initiated it as a Sacrament...we all know that early baptism indicated that you were a member of the new Christian church...that it was done to cleanse the soul of original sin...so far, so good, but there can be only valid Baptism....if someone dunks you, or pours water on your head AFTER you have been validly baptized, you just get wet.

Baptism introduces you into the Catholic Church (Christianity)...what you do after that is up to you...you can either stay in the cradle of Christianity, or you can fall away from the true church and explore new and wierd ways of trying to get to heaven. Luther did, Storch and Munzer did, Henry VIII did, Calvin did, Knox did, Fox did, The Wesley brothers did.....good luck, but it will be hard to pick a new name if you decide to start a new denomination, all the good ones are gone.

[Iscool]

no He didn't...He commanded us to do THIS (what He had done at the last supper) and then told us why to do THIS.....the THIS is important, the why is incidental

And what is the 'THIS'??? The THIS is that Jesus broke some bread into pieces and passed it around for the disciples to eat...That's the THIS...And Jesus said to do THIS in remembrance of him...

Your tradition of weaseling in your false doctrine of your Euharist is nothing but the doctrine of men...You CAN NOT get your Eucharist out of the scripture without adding or taking away words of scripture...And God has a message for you...

Mat 15:7 Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying,
Mat 15:8 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me.
Mat 15:9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

There is no Eucharist in the scriptures...It is purely, 100% a fabrication of the Catholic religion with no bible basis whatsoever...

[terycarl]

I can't believe you are STILL trying this line! The church RECEIVED the divinely-inspired word of God as it was GIVEN to them and they OBEYED it because they knew it WAS from God. Nobody in the group you identify with can claim they EVER had any authority to "determine" what was from God. I think it is terrible how twisted this simple truth has become in Roman Catholicism. It does, however, explain why other perverted doctrines developed there.

so you are saying that the early church (Catholics) accepted every writing, every book, every opinion, every tradition, that was put before them.....and made no decisions as to which were inspired and which were opinions only, that they accepted at face value everything placed before them........you really don't believe that, do you??????

[terycarl]

History shows the accretion of pagan beliefs and practices into the roman church.

no it doesn't!

[terycarl]

We just reject the magic thinking that arose much later.

Take this and eat of it, THIS IS MY BODY....Unless you eat of the flesh of the son of Man and drink of His blood.....

1Cor 10:16....the bible is replete with references to the true presence in the Eucharist, but Prottys continue to bury their heads in the sand because they just don't have enough faith to accept it....remember about moving the tree and planting it in the ocean....they couldn't even blow the dead leaves off of it.

[boatbums]

So are YOU saying that the early Christians didn't have THE Apostles to deliver the Scriptures to them as their rule of faith? Are you saying the early Christians didn't already HAVE the Old Testament Scriptures - recognized by them already as the HOLY word of God - from which to understand the teachings that were being given to them? Are you saying that the Holy Spirit had nothing to do with the recognition of the Divine word of God in the hearts of the believers and that the Scriptures were the POWER of God unto salvation to all those that believed??? The way you make it sound your “Catholic” (upper case “C”) church took it upon themselves to tell GOD what they would or would not accept. THAT is what I am disputing here. Perhaps the way you word your posts has something to do with that?

[terycarl]

Comparing the Reformation to the Holocaust now??? Isn't there some internet "rule" about that? It sure sounds like God was happy with it since He continued to save those who came to Him in faith APART from the Roman Catholic Church. You can continue to believe in the myths your church spins around what really happened and the rest of us will continue on in the winning of souls to Christ, living lives that glorify and honor Him.

I made no such comparison other than to state that they both occured, therefore, in your opinion, God must have approved.

you state that God continues to save those who do not follow Catholicism.....how do you know that???

You describe the teachings of the Catholic church as Myths....how do you know that???

the Catholic Church has taught the same thing for 2,013 years, it was the revolutionaries that decided to change things. Crackers and grape juice VS The Body and Blood of Christ ????? O.K. I guess, I'll stick with the 2,013 year old truth.