Spiritual Disciplines, Scripture Study Series

Start by reading three random passages from A Fisherman’s Tale.

You may have recognized those passages as random paragraphs from my new book, “A Fisherman’s Tale.” And from those three passages, you probably figured out that the book is about Jesus. It is a retelling of the Gospel from Simon Peter’s perspective.

But they were three disconnected passages selected randomly and not really connected to one another. For the most part, you probably aren’t even sure what part of the Jesus story they are from. I’m not even sure, and I wrote them.

And tomorrow, if you picked up your copy of the book again and read three more passages, you really wouldn’t be much further ahead. Eventually, if you did that every day, there’d be a pretty good chance you’d have read the entire book.

Especially if you marked the passages as you read them and maybe made notes about how the passage spoke to you. But while you would have all of the words up here, the story would be disjointed and probably wouldn’t make much sense.

And while we would never think of reading a novel or a textbook that way, that’s the way some people read their bibles. Piecemeal, a passage here and a passage there. Maybe using a devotional like Our Daily Bread, or by just randomly picking up their bible, opening it up and reading. And there’s nothing wrong with using a devotional guide, but it’s not studying the bible, or for that matter even reading the bible.

Some people treat their bibles almost like a sacred Ouija board or Magic Eight Ball. They ask a question and then reach in to pull out an answer.

This is week five of our Spiritual Disciplines Series at Cornerstone. And over the past five weeks, we’ve looked at What Spiritual Disciplines aren’t, we’ve looked at Sabbath Keeping and Worship as forms of spiritual disciplines, and last Sunday, Pastor Rob introduced you to the concept of Fasting.

This morning I’d like to talk about studying the scriptures. Not reading your bible devotionally or recreationally but studying it. Martin Luther wrote, “Let the man who would hear God speak, read Holy Scriptures.”

You may have noticed that in my messages I use a lot of scriptures and that is because, through the years, I have come to the understanding that nothing that I or anyone else has to say has the potential eternal consequences of God’s word.

You don’t come to church on Sunday Morning to hear the collected wisdom of Denn Guptill. You come to hear from the Bible, the word of God, the Holy Scriptures, so I don’t want to take the time you have entrusted me with to let you know what I think.

And so, in the scripture read this morning, Paul is writing to a young pastor by the name of Timothy. And as we read this, we need to remember that 2 Timothy is a personal letter; it wasn’t addressed to the congregation in the Ephesian church. It was addressed to the pastor of the Ephesian church. We are reading someone else’s mail.

When the letter was written, Paul was in prison in Rome facing execution, and he was taking the time to write and encourage Timothy and to remind him of his calling.

And part of what Paul reminds Timothy of is his heritage, how he was brought up in a Godly home with a foundation established on the scriptures. And so, Paul tells Timothy 2 Timothy 1:5 I remember your genuine faith, for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother Lois and your mother, Eunice. And I know that same faith continues strong in you.

And that goes back to what Solomon wrote in Proverbs 22:6 Direct your children onto the right path, and when they are older, they will not leave it.

Now, remember that this is a proverb, not a promise. If you do these things, then there is a strong probability that this will be the result.

In other words, parents do your best when your kids are little and hope for the best when they grow up. And Timothy had that heritage.

It would appear that his Mother, Eunice and his Grandmother, Lois were followers of Christ and that they had brought Timothy up in the faith.

Now understand that these ladies came to their faith through a Jewish background, so that is how Timothy would have been raised. The scriptures that he would have been taught would have been the Jewish scriptures, what we know as the Old Testament, because the New Testament was still a work in progress for Timothy.

After He turned 13, the Rabbis would have felt that He was responsible enough to observe all the mitzvahs, which were the divine commandments or meritorious acts. As He grew, He would have read the Talmud, which was the books of wisdom written by the Rabbis through the centuries. And in those books, He would have learnt things like “Never threaten a child, either punish him or forgive him.” or “A child’s tears move heaven itself,” or “Why was man created on the last day, so when pride takes a man it can be said, ‘God created the fly before you.’”