This podcast covers Lesson 1 of Adorn Yourself with Godliness Bible Study by Melanie Newton.

Grasping God’s Truth Is Essential to Godliness

Truth enhances your devotion to God. Error takes you away from Him. Both influence how you adorn yourself. Grasping God’s truth is essential to godliness.

Teach and maintain truth; Guard against error.

• Any error that persists is like a spiritual infection in the Body of Christ. And, like an infection in the human body, it always affects life so it must be addressed.
• The answer to all spiritual infections is the truth that has been given to us in the Bible, especially in the New Testament. The historical reliability of the Scriptures can be investigated to show that the biblical records are trustworthy.

Dwell in truth you can know.

• To dwell in truth is to make your home there. That means God’s truth dominates your thoughts and attitudes, governs your life, and satisfies your heart.
• Read through the Gospels, getting to know Jesus well. Then, continue reading through the whole New Testament to get the big picture of what your salvation is all about. Then, go back and read through the Old Testament to get the grand picture of God and His plan throughout the ages.
• God gives us plenty of truth in the Bible that we can know and trust. 66 books, 1189 chapters!
• God wants us to know the truth He has revealed to us, to make our home in that truth.

Humbly accept what you don’t know or understand.

• Some things we read in the Bible we don’t understand now but might in the future. There is much we can know now. But, there are things we’ll never know or understand. Deuteronomy 29:29
• We can do our best to try to understand what is written. When you run across something that you can’t seem to understand from a Bible passage, make the choice to humbly accept what you don’t know or understand. 

Discern all teaching through the complete revelation of God’s Word.

1. Evaluate what you read and hear by comparing it with the whole Bible.

• Read any verse in the context of the passage where it is found—the paragraph, the chapter, and the book.
• Look at other verses with similar content to let the Bible interpret itself. And, you should always ask the Holy Spirit for understanding.
• Remember that even the best teachers are not infallible. Most are 80-90% right in what they teach and would love to know where they are wrong so they can change it. Always check what you read and hear with what the Word of God says.

2. Avoid the “look-imagine-see dragon” when viewing any verse.

The “look-imagine-see” dragon shows up this way: someone looks at a verse or passage, imagines what they want it to say, then in their mind sees what they have imagined through twisting word meanings and interpretations. Once it starts, it’s like a fiery dragon burning truth in its path. Cultural influence on Bible study feeds this dragon.

• Tame the “look-imagine-see dragon” by considering the Bible as sufficient on its own, not needing our “improvement.”
• Tame the “look-imagine-see dragon” by basing your faith on what is in God’s Word, not something you’ve just heard about it and not something you’re imagining to be there.
• Tame the “look-imagine-see dragon” by following the inductive process for Bible Study—observation, interpretation, and application. Then, you can confidently dwell in that truth you can know.

Conclusion

Grasping God’s truth is essential for godliness. Grasping truth protects you and preserves your freedom. Believers in Jesus Christ should never stop learning His word and learning from His word. Everything we go through adds to it as we make the right decisions and learn to avoid the bad ones.

The Bible is the greatest of all books; to study it is the noblest of all pursuits; to understand it, the highest of all goals. (Charles Ryrie)

Receive the word of God. Accept it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God. Then, let it permeate your whole being so that you will not only be devoted to God but also be able to adorn yourself with godliness.

Let Jesus satisfy your heart with such love for God that you will want to live a life that pleases Him.

 

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