Seize the Summer: Removing Barriers (part 3)featured

Here’s our third group of barriers to time in the Word:
“I connect with God in other ways.”
“I don’t agree with everything the Bible says.”

We’ll call these “Authority Issues.”

In both of these cases, we have a low of view of the Bible.

Maybe it’s not that you doubt the Bible’s authority, it’s just that you prefer a less intellectual approach to God. The words are dry or confusing, and you believe you’ve found other ways to connect with God. Especially as women, we are prone to search out a more emotional, mystical experience with God. We want to hear from God personally and reading the Bible just doesn’t always produce that.

Or perhaps you do in fact doubt the Bible’s authority. You don’t like some of the teachings of Scripture and so you’ve found a way to try to avoid them. When I encountered this description of myself in Romans 1, it took me a long time to call it what it was: arrogance. I had “exchanged the truth about God for a lie”; I thought I knew better and I wanted to be my own boss.

First, we need to search our hearts and … repent and believe the Gospel.

I start with this again because an opportunity to confess sin is an opportunity to rejoice in the Gospel. Any time we stare in the face of God’s authority and declare that we know better, we are proud; we are in sin against a holy God; we are deserving of His wrath. But Jesus humbled himself unto death, even death on a cross! And because of His humility in our place, we can come confidently before God and repent of our arrogance and bask in His mercy.

Here’s the reality: God has chosen to communicate with us through His Word. At River City, one of our core values is the Word, spelled out like this:

“We hold the Word of God (The Bible) as our ultimate authority in all matters of life.”

Only words can communicate truth with precision. God did not leave us pictures in the sky and hope we would figure it out. His glory is declared by creation, yes, but his character is spelled out for us in words that we can read and study and meditate on. And, what’s more, these words are alive and active!

If you struggle to embrace Scripture as God’s authoritative revelation of Himself and His will, then pray for faith to believe what Scripture says about itself. Ask God to help your unbelief! And then I would challenge you to set out to convince yourself. Study the doctrine of Scripture. Learn how the canon was formed. Look at the big picture and how every piece of the story weaves together. Pray that God would give you confidence in His Word.

The Bible says so much about its value—it is profitable for instruction, for rebuke, for correction, for training; it’s our offense and defense; it brings freedom; it sanctifies us; it brings healing; it is the way God draws people to Himself, through the proclamation of the Gospel. Ultimately, they are the words of Life because they reveal Christ. The whole Bible is about Him.

So we need to grow in our understanding of why the Bible is reliable and authoritative and a gift to us.

And then we need to trust that God will use the means He’s given.

Scripture is one of the “means of grace”—the ways in which God strengthens his work of grace in our hearts.

Tim Chester writes, “The Word of God is perhaps God’s primary means of changing us. … It’s the water by which we’re washed, the weapon with which we fight, the toolkit with which we’re equipped, and the milk by which we grow.” He goes on to say that the Bible reveals our hearts and the Bible reveals Christ’s glory. And as we behold the glory of Christ, Scripture says we are changed from one degree of glory to another.

This can be hard to believe when the words can so often feel distant and impersonal. This great article speaks to that. We need to trust that God speaks personally through His Word, but that does not mean we are entitled to an emotional experience every time we come before Scripture. Even if we do not feel anything, we can trust that every deposit we make from the Scriptures into our hearts is accomplishing what God has promised. Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Faith might look like coming to your Bible day after day, trusting that the Lord will use the means He has given to strengthen his work of grace in our hearts.