Context Is Key

Making Sense of It All

If you are anything like the average person picking up the Bible, you've probably asked this question many times: "What does this have to do with me/other parts of the Bible/life/Jesus/anything?" That is a puzzling question that we must wrestle if we are to make any sense out of what the Bible is and what it is trying to accomplish. That's where we need to bring up the idea of "context". If someone were to start saying a number to you starting with “one hundred” and you stopped listening right then, you might think they were talking about a hundred dollars. But if you listened further, you might find out they were about to say, “one hundred million, five hundred thousand, eight hundred and fifty one people.” The actual figure was not only bigger, it was also more nuanced. It’s the same thing with the Bible. Often the answer is much bigger than we expect and more nuanced than we’d imagine.

Morning and Evening

I'm reading Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon, which is a fantastic collection of brief thoughts by the great preacher. One of the morning snippets was based on Isaiah 54:17, which is all about the idea that "no weapon turned against us will succeed and we will silence every voice raised against." The verse was wonderful and the text was on point, but I felt like I was missing some context to what I was reading. I quickly jumped my Bible app on my phone and listened to the full chapter of Isaiah 54 and then I looked up The Bible Project's Isaiah poster. While I mulled over the chapter, my eyes were opened up to a deeper, more rich understanding of what the verse at the end of the chapter was talking about.

Before that point, It was as if I had been taking a beautiful crescendo of a song and playing it by itself over and over again. It was not that the crescendo was not impactful on its own, but that, when read within the larger context of the chapter, the crescendo was that much more meaningful. The ebbs and flows, the ups and downs, the flow of the words as they swelled and peaked. Once I finished the chapter, the power of the ending became bolstered by, not confused by, the weight of the words that came before it.

[bctt tweet="Scripture requires context to be fully understood and enjoyed." username="everetthill"]

Let me put it another way: Out of context, the Imperial March from Star Wars is a pretty awesome song, but put it alongside the visuals of Darth Vader walking down the ramp into the Death Star to crush the Rebellion is something else entirely. It'll give you goosebumps.

Holding It All Together

Our scripture reading must always be held in context. It is not that we need to read the entire Bible every morning to be able to understand a particular verse. We must continue to read the Bible as a work that is deeply connected and intertwined with itself. We must remind ourselves that Proverbs is connected to Matthew, that John 3:16 is not the only verse in that chapter, and that God inspired this word quilt we call the Bible.

The Montage

I want to challenge you to make your reading of scripture all about taking the ideas you've been absorbing in your daily (yes, daily) Bible reading and holding them up to each other. The Bible will blow you away by all of the richness you will find when you read it in context. The Bible isn't a grouping of pithy sayings and trite stories. It's a montage that is meant to be seen coherently and cohesively leading to Jesus and his plan to rescue humanity. It is critical that we read, study, discuss and understand the Bible in its greater context.

Question:

What surprising connections have you made lately in your Bible reading?