Bible Study Is Not Just About Finding A Takeaway

After completing a Bible study exercise, we might find ourselves with something in front of us that summarizes a Bible passage or pulls something out of it in a nice, clear way. It is a finished product of some work we just did.

But is that what we just did the work for? Was it to have the finished product to look at so we know better now what’s in the passage, or to have a sentence of truth or wisdom to keep in mind the rest of the day?

If that’s what we do personal Bible study for, we might as well not do personal Bible Study. We might as well use someone else’s finished product without using up our time to come up with one.

Actually, that’s not quite right because doing it ourselves does help us learn and remember a lot better, but the learning and remembering better is not a totally worthwhile purpose. Is our goal just to put good truths of God in our minds and know what’s in the Bible? Why? So we can remember to trust Him and do right things?

No, that’s not all there is. That’s not all God made us for.

He is God. He wants us to know His glory. He wants us to know the glory of the grace He gives us. He wants us to have an intimate, unbreakable relationship with Him and always be amazed by His greatness and love.

That’s why we study the Bible. It is about being satisfied with the goodness of His house (Ps. 65:4).

Let’s say we are examining a passage and we look for a lesson for our daily lives. “I should be thankful and not complain,” we come up with. Is that little takeaway alone going to help us? Is that the main thing we should come to the Bible for? No. As we see God’s glory and are filled with His Spirit, we will find ourselves being thankful more and complaining less. When we come to the Bible, we can see His glory more.

Let’s say we made an outline or diagram of the book of Luke, and now we have it lying before us. It shows the broad picture, and many details. We put much work into it. Would it have been better to find a shortcut so we could have the finished product faster? Maybe get one from the internet or have AI make it for us? In doing it ourselves, we meditated on it a lot. It was so much opportunity to fellowship with God and worship Him. The end product is just something that helps us think on the passage more. So why would we want a shortcut to skip the majority of the meditation?

In Bible study, a lot of the purpose is in the process, not the product.