A "Bible study" is an aid to help one or more (but usually a group) people to work through and understand a particular passage from the Bible. It may contain comments on the passage, but mostly consists of questions. These questions are meant to facilitate discussion within a group and serve as a guide to help people work through the passage by showing them what needs to be asked and understood.
During MYC 2009 [2] I was part of a workshop that studied how to compile a Bible study for a passage in the New Testament. We were given Hebrews 12:18–29 and had three days to complete our Bible studies.
The main idea of this Bible study is: Through Jesus, we do not need to fear condemnation, but can be sure of redemption if we follow Him closely. The Bible study was presented on 19 July 2009.
The target group I wrote this passage for is students who are growing in their faith and who have at least a very basic knowledge of the Old Testament.
18You have not come to a mountain that can be touched and that is burning with fire; to darkness, gloom and storm; 19to a trumpet blast or to such a voice speaking words that those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them, 20because they could not bear what was commanded: "If even an animal touches the mountain, it must be stoned." 21The sight was so terrifying that Moses said, "I am trembling with fear."
22But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, to the city of the living God. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, 23to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the judge of all men, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect, 24to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.
25See to it that you do not refuse Him who speaks. If they did not escape when they refused Him who warned them on earth, how much less will we, if we turn away from Him who warns us from heaven? 26At that time His voice shook the earth, but now He has promised: "Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heaven." 27The words "once more" indicate the removing of what can be shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. 28Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, 29for our "God is a consuming fire." — Hebrews 12:18–29 (NIV)
The passage was well received by the group. Admittedly, I didn't have time to progress past a first draft. I was therefore expecting (and hoping for) some criticism, but didn't get any. I can, however, highlight some of the things which bothered me:
We were strongly urged not to use any Bible commentaries or other study aids in writing our Bible studies. The idea was that we should wrestle with the passage ourselves and come to insights for ourselves. When I returned home after MYC, I was eager, however, to see what the NIV study Bible had to say about the passage. I was shocked when I learned that, in v. 23, "Firstborn cannot refer to Christ, since here the Greek word is plural. Now, I (as well as other members of my workshop group) had question 4, for which the intended answer was "Jesus". This again highlighted how careful one needs to be when compiling a Bible study. The NIV text makes an ambiguous effort to dispel what seems to be an obvious assumption: the word "firstborn" does not indicate singularity of plurality, but the phrase the "church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven" uses "names" which indicates plurality. But does this mean that "firstborn" is plural, or does is refer to those who are within "the church (of the Firstborn)"?
The KJV/MKJV might also lead to confusion: "the general assembly and church of the firstborn"
The ESV and ISV are more helpful: "the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven". (This is also very close to what is in the 1983 Afrikaans translation.)
This Bible study was composed as part of a workshop while attending Equip 2010 [4]. In that workshop, we looked at Old Testament passages with an understanding that the entire Old Testament points towards Yeshua. We were given Genesis 23 to study and looked at it over three days, presenting our final Bible study on the fourth.
The main ideas were
The target group of this study would be Christians, perhaps young in their faith, exploring the Old Testament.
This study was presented to the workshop on 5 April 2010.
1Sarah lived to be a hundred and twenty-seven years old. 2She died at Kiriath Arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went to mourn for Sarah and to weep over her. 3Then Abraham rose from beside his dead wife and spoke to the Hittites. He said, 4"I am an alien and a stranger among you. Sell me some property for a burial site here so I can bury my dead." 5The Hittites replied to Abraham, 6"Sir, listen to us. You are a mighty prince among us. Bury your dead in the choicest of our tombs. None of us will refuse you his tomb for burying your dead." 7Then Abraham rose and bowed down before the people of the land, the Hittites. 8He said to them, "If you are willing to let me bury my dead, then listen to me and intercede with Ephron son of Zohar on my behalf 9so he will sell me the cave of Machpelah, which belongs to him and is at the end of his field. Ask him to sell it to me for the full price as a burial site among you." 10Ephron the Hittite was sitting among his people and he replied to Abraham in the hearing of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of his city. 11 "No, my lord," he said. "Listen to me; I give you the field, and I give you the cave that is in it. I give it to you in the presence of my people. Bury your dead." 12Again Abraham bowed down before the people of the land 13and he said to Ephron in their hearing, "Listen to me, if you will. I will pay the price of the field. Accept it from me so I can bury my dead there." 14Ephron answered Abraham, 15"Listen to me, my lord; the land is worth four hundred shekels of silver, but what is that between me and you? Bury your dead." 16Abraham agreed to Ephron's terms and weighed out for him the price he had named in the hearing of the Hittites: four hundred shekels of silver, according to the weight current among the merchants. 17So Ephron's field in Machpelah near Mamre—both the field and the cave in it, and all the trees within the borders of the field—was deeded 18to Abraham as his property in the presence of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of the city. 19Afterward Abraham buried his wife Sarah in the cave in the field of Machpelah near Mamre (which is at Hebron) in the land of Canaan. 20So the field and the cave in it were deeded to Abraham by the Hittites as a burial site. — Genesis 23 (NIV)
The Bible study was well received. It was a different approach than most other in the group had followed; their target group was more mature Christians and relied somewhat on the Swedish Method. My approach was partially inspired by the approach certain Bible study guides take, especially the interactive Bible studies [5] published by Matthias Media [6].
I found writing this Bible study challenging and what I presented was only, in effect, my first draft. Writing the launching question was particularly difficult and I never come back to it. I considered several different possible launching questions, but settled on the one above to get the audience thinking about loss and alienation in a strange place. I hoped to evoke some empathy for Abraham in his situation as described in the passage.
Admittedly, I never tied the passage back to a New Testament, which I probably would have done if I had more time. Possible such passages could have included, but not limited to, Romans 9:6–8, Hebrews 11:8–16, Acts 7:2–16 and 1 Peter 1:3–12.
The main points of criticism were:
The leader of the workshop and I were somewhat at odds about the main idea of the passage. While I placed emphasis on Abraham's faithfulness, he believed it should rather have been on God's faithfulness. I do not think one should necessarily make such a distinction: one ties in to the other (Abraham is faithful to God because He is faithful, and God will in turn honour His promises because Abraham is faithful and obedient). It should have made this point more clear in this Bible study.
Another reason why I stuck with Abraham's faithfulness as a theme, is because that is how I believe the apostles presented him whenever they wrote about him (see, for example, Hebrews 11 and Acts 7).
I wanted to tie the ideas of faithfulness and obedience to how it is when one comes to Yeshua: a person believes Yeshua can forgive sins and accepts this forgiveness (faithfulness), and appoints Him as Lord and Ruler over his/her live (obedience).
This was a challenging Bible study to write, but one that taught me much. I learned how a Biblical passage can easily be twisted to say something which it, in fact, doesn't.
Additional questions which didn't make the final cut:
"The
meaning of a passage is always the same and must always be taught. This mustnot be changed to suit a particular audience! Theapplication of a passage can be tailored to a specific audience."
"What would the gap [in the Bible] be if our passage was taken out of the Bible?"
At Equip 2011 [8] I was introduced to doing systematic theology Bible studies. Systematic theology is taking a single topic and then looking at what the Bible as a whole has to say about that topic. This is different from Biblical theology, which we had studied in previous [9] years [10], in that Biblical theology considers how a single passage forms part of God's greater plan.
Systematic theology obviously requires hard work, as you need to consider all that the Bible has to say before reaching a conclusion! One also needs to resist the temptation of using proof texts out of their individual immediate contexts. All that said, I found writing this study slightly less taxing than the previous two. Obviously we were limited by time and could not consider all the passages in the Bible which dealt with the topic (we were limited to six passages, but I went slightly over), but we still had to search the Bible for key passages which we wanted to use in our studies.
Our topic was poverty. My main idea was to show the link between poverty and sin, and what the response of a Christian to poverty should be.
This study was presented to the workshop on 25 April 2011.
In 2005, film producer Morgan Spurlock and his fiancée Alexandra Jamieson had their bank accounts frozen and took minimum wage jobs for 30 days. They soon found themselves in trouble: unable to afford basic medical care, they were spiraling into debt. Their experiment highlighted serious flaws in the American social security system.
We have seen that poverty will only ever exist in a period of human history whre we are living under the effects of sin. Poverty is not, however, now a universal punishment for sin.
The Bible study was well received. I tried to thread the different passages together by connecting ideas of abundance with God and lacking without Him. Again this was but a first draft and could do with some refinement.
The main criticism was that it was much too long. I somehow got confused as to the length. But then this study could be presented as a short series of Bible studies.
Other ideas which could have been explored:
Links
[1] https://siyach.org/comment/reply/14#comment-form
[2] https://siyach.org/node/8
[3] https://siyach.org/comment/reply/13#comment-form
[4] https://siyach.org/node/68
[5] http://www.matthiasmedia.com.au/growth/interactive-bible-studies
[6] http://www.matthiasmedia.com.au
[7] https://siyach.org/comment/reply/69#comment-form
[8] https://siyach.org/node/129
[9] https://siyach.org/node/13
[10] https://siyach.org/node/69
[11] https://siyach.org/comment/reply/127#comment-form