Word of the Week: "Interpretation"

Pastor Josh
00:00:00

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world. In this podcast series, we're going to be looking into biblical words that have great significance to our faith.

The name of this series is called the word of the week, where once a week we will dive deeper into these words that we are familiar with in scripture. So come along with me. Let's study the word of the week. Pastor Josh here. The word of the week is interpretation.

Last week we looked at biblical inspiration and how that term essentially means that the Bible is given to us from God, directly from him. The source of scripture is God inspired, means God breathed.

And so when we look at the Bible, we know that it is given to us by God as his word for us to follow. But there's one thing to recognize, that the Bible is given to us from God. It's another thing to interpret it the way that we should interpret it.

The Bible actually warns us against false interpretation or misinterpretation. The Bible says in two TimoTHy, chapter two, verse 15, study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed.

Rightly dividing the word of truth. I want us to focus in on that last phrase. They're rightly dividing the word of truth.

Or you could say it like this, rightly handling the word of truth, interpreting the Bible correctly. Now, all of us understand this, or at least we should understand that. We will never understand the Bible completely, perfectly this side of heaven.

But we do need to understand that.

The Bible calls us to strive to study the scriptures, to dive deep into scriptures, and to rightly divide or rightly interpret what the word of God has to say.

You know, there could be someone that says, I believe that this is the word of God, but I believe that this is interpreted differently than you're interpreting this. And so we can come down the line on different sides when it comes to interpretation, even if we believe that this is the word of God.

So how can we deal with this?

Well, really, what we need to understand first and foremost is that the study of the principles and methods of interpreting scriptures, something called hermeneutics, biblical hermeneutics, I know that's a big term, and I know that's something that can sometimes be a little daunting to think about. But the Bible does tell us that there is a specific way that we are to deal with scripture.

And it says here in two Timothy, chapter two, rightly dividing the word of truth. And so it's important to interpret scripture correctly because we get to the next step of application.

And so our application must be tied to right interpretation. That's tied to the inspiration of God. And so the way that you could think about it is this.

To have the right application of scripture, we must rightly interpret scripture and understand that it's inspired. So what are we doing to apply the instruction given to us by God through our proper interpretation, through inspiration?

And so I want to give you some tools in rightly dividing the word of truth. The Bible tells us that it's so important to see the word of God as literally the word of God.

And so I believe one of the most important principles in dealing with interpretation of scripture is to take the Bible literally or basically understanding the Bible in its normal and plain meaning, unless the passage is obviously and very clearly laying out a symbolic or figurative speech. For example, God is a rock.

We know he's not literally a rock, but we know that that is describing something that God could be compared to for us to understand. So certainly there are some symbolic, figurative references in scripture, but contextually, we understand those.

The difficulty that comes with interpreting scripture is what is figurative and what is literal? Well, we have to look at context, and that's really the next step of understanding the interpretation of scripture.

Is interpreting scripture historically, in context, grammatically in context, and really just in the understanding of contextually in the chapter and in the book that we're reading. You know, we can get into a lot of difficulty when we come to a passage of scripture and say, well, what is this saying for me?

Well, before we start getting to application, we have to see contextually what the Bible is actually teaching. And if we're interpreting correctly, because we could look at a passage and misinterpret that passage and then misapply that passage to our life.

And so one of the things you have to take in, in the understanding of how to interpret is historically, who is the original author through the inspiration of scripture, addressing. Obviously, the people that were in the time of the Bible had a different culture. Historically speaking.

They had a different viewpoint on certain things. If you studied the book of Ruth and the things that she was doing with Boaz, right.

That doesn't make sense to us in our context today, but it made sense for them back in the time that they lived. And all of that can be seen throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament.

So it takes some study to understand contextually and historically what it's talking about there.

Grammatically, I don't think you have to be a proper grammarian to understand scripture, but it is important to understand what the Bible is saying in the original language, in the original Hebrew, in the original Greek.

And with enough commentaries today that are available to us online, it's very easy to dive deeper into those greek lexicons and to see those true definitions of what those greek words are. And so we have to understand that. We have to understand that as we read a passage of scripture, we can't just take one verse out of context.

We have to see what's been leading up to that verse. What's the whole chapter been talking about? What's this whole book been talking about? What comes after this?

And so, to rightly divide the word of truth, obviously, we have to get into it, right? That's what it says in two Timothy, chapter two, study to show thyself approved unto goddess a workman. So it takes effort.

But through that effort comes that confidence that we are doing our best to rightly divide the word of truth. Now, will we make some mistakes? Of course, because we're human. But obviously, we need to check ourselves. We need to have godly counselors around us.

And so it takes a lot of steps to get to a place where we can feel, you know what? And we can know. For that matter, we can know that we are doing our best to rightly divide the word of truth.

For, for example, you could look at the passage of scripture where Jesus says, you know what? Love your neighbor. Well, first of all, who is my neighbor?

Well, to understand it from the wrong context, might say, well, okay, I need to love the people that live to the left and right of me in my neighborhood and across the street from me. But we know through context that Jesus isn't just talking about those who live right next to you.

He's talking about those that you come across in your life. Another thing that you could misinterpret there is that word love. Our culture today speaks of love in a very romantic way, a very selfish way.

But Jesus is speaking there of agape love. He's speaking of sacrificial love. He's not talking about the love that's laid out for us in our culture today.

He's talking about the love that's described in one corinthians chapter 13. And so we need to know the whole scope of scripture, from Genesis to revelation. What is it talking about here?

Now, we know the Bible doesn't contradict itself. Sometimes there can be what we would call seeming contradictions.

But if we read the Bible in its complete form, we know that this isn't contradicting this. This is just seeing this from a different perspective. One of those examples would be the book of James.

If you read the book of James outside of the whole context of scripture, you might tend to think that there's works needed for salvation.

Now, he's not teaching that, but if you looked at that from an isolated standpoint and didn't understand all of what the rest of scripture says, you might be tempted to think that, hey, you know what? Works need to be added to salvation for our forgiveness. But we know that we are saved by God's grace through our faith, faith alone.

And it's the works that are produced through that true faith. And so it took context to understand that.

Now, we could talk a lot about this, and we will not take up too much time dealing with interpretation, but it is so important to understand interpretation when it comes to that next step of application. And next week, we'll look more at the application process. But it's all about the application of the interpretation of the inspiration.

And so I would encourage you, as you read scripture first and foremost, to read scripture. Study, do your best, strive to dig deeper into the word. The Bible speaks of meditation.

Obviously, we know that this isn't talking about the cultural meditation of clearing our minds and emptying our minds. No. It's about standing upon the truths of God and dwelling upon the truths in a healthy way.

It's so important to interpret scripture because as we interpret scripture properly, can guide our steps. I love what psalm 119 says. In psalm 119, we look at a couple of different verses here.

Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against thee. That's verse eleven. So as we hide God's word in our heart, as we memorize it, as we meditate upon it, it allows us to live that life of holiness.

It allows us to live that life of righteousness, not because we're just trying really hard, but now we know the word of God, and now we're dwelling upon the word of God.

And so, as we meditate upon the word of God, as we dwell upon it, as it says in verse 15 of psalm 119, I will meditate in thy precepts and have respect unto thy ways. Verse 16, I will delight myself in thy statutes, I will not forget thy word.

And so, over and over again in that chapter, we are reminded of the importance of meditating upon the truth of God. Psalm one reminds us of that. It tells us that we will be like trees planted by the rivers of water when we meditate upon the truths of God's word.

Later on in psalm 119, verse 105, we are reminded of the light that it brings us in our life. Psalm 119 105 says, thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.

And so to rightly divide the word of truth allows us to get to a place in our life where we are guided by his word. And so I would encourage you to think about, yes, the source of scripture is God.

But secondarily, we need to understand that as we interpret scripture, we need to interpret it as God would have us interpret it, not the way that we would want to interpret it. So there's two terms that I want to leave you with here today. There's the term eisegesis and exegesis.

Eisegesis is a term for the action of us, taking what we already believe and what we want to think and imparting that into scripture, basically adding it to scripture or trying to find those truths there in scripture. Exegesis is looking at the text and pulling out from the text the actual teaching that's there.

And so it's important to practice exegesis because we want to make sure we know what the Bible says, right. We want to be Bereans. We want to dig deeper and say, okay, what is the Bible teaching me? Not what can I bring into the Bible?

And so Iseousis would be me saying, I know that this is true. I want this to be true. This is what I believe. And so where can I find in scripture that to fit into my belief system?

So we never want to bring into the scriptures what we want it to say. We want to see exactly what the Bible has to say to us. So that might be different than what we want it to say.

So I would encourage you to think about those two terms, exegesis pulling out of the passage to the truth, or Isajesus infusing into the passage what we want it to say.

And so, in so doing, we can learn from scripture, we can grow from scripture, instead of trying to make scripture fit into our box, into our culture, into our lifestyle. And so sometimes there's some justification with that. Right. Well, I feel good about doing this.

So can I find something in scripture that can make me feel better about myself instead of saying, well, what does the Bible say about my life? And do I need to change this? Does God want me to grow in this area?

And so part of interpretation in that hermeneutic model is to pull out from the passage what is there not to infuse what we want to be there. Now, we're seeing that in culture today.

We're seeing people trying to fit their lifestyle, their belief system, their comfort into what scripture says. And we can even see a lot of people saying, well, that was the culture back then, but this is the culture now.

So we need to interpret it with that mindset. And so there's danger with that. Because if we say that that was the culture, then, this is the culture now.

We can change that teaching then basically, we have the latitude and the freedom in our own minds to then change anything we want to our culture today. And we know that the truths of scripture never change.

The Bible says that the grass will wither, it will pass away, but the word of God will stand forever. And so the word of God standing forever means the truths that are in the word of God will stand forever.

Forever, o Lord, is thy word settled in heaven. And so the word of God is eternal. Its impact is timeless. It doesn't change over culture.

Now, sometimes in the application, there might be some differences, right, in the concept of, okay, let's look at iPhones, right? Or smartphones. Smartphones weren't around 2000 years ago.

And so obviously the Bible doesn't speak directly to smartphones and how we should deal with them, but it does speak to the principles that are involved in the idea of self control, not putting wicked things before our eyes, not allowing something to control our lives. That's all there in scripture.

And so what we do is we look at our life and we see how the truths of scripture that we're interpreting correctly as two Timothy, chapter two tells us to do, to rightly divide the word of truth as we rightly divide the word of truth, then we take those truths with us and then we apply them to our life today. We apply them to what we're dealing with today.

So many times people want to go from inspiration and go right to application without the proper interpretation there. And so, again, we're not going to be perfect. You're not going to be perfect. I'm not going to be perfect.

We're going to misinterpret passages, we're going to misunderstand passages. But it's so important for us to dig deeper into understanding those checks and balances when it comes to looking at scripture.

So I could say this, scripture is always the best commentary on scripture. And so for that reason, make sure you read more passages.

Maybe you read a passage of scripture and it confuses you, or maybe it kind of contradicts what you think it should say. Go and read the rest of scripture. See what the Bible has to say about the topic.

I mean, ultimately, in John 1717, Jesus says, sanctify them through thy truth. Thy word is truth. The Bible is truth. So many times in our world today, people want to come up with other truths.

But what we do is we start with scripture as our truth and we build from there.

And so I would encourage you, as you study scripture, read, meditate, grow in the truth of God, grow in the understanding of what that means for your life. But start with that proper interpretation. So start with the understanding of inspiration. This is coming from God, not a work of man.

All scripture is given by inspiration of God. And it's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction and righteousness.

And then go from that understanding of interpretation, or, excuse me, inspiration, and then take it to that interpretation and say, okay, what is this saying? What is this teaching? And then next week, we will look at application. What does this look like in our lives after we go past the interpretive stage?

So, thank you so much for listening today. I hope that this has been a help for you.

I hope that you can continue to study the word of God, and as the Bible says there in two Timothy, chapter two, verse 15, to rightly divide the word of truth. Well, God bless you. Have a wonderful week. We will talk to you next week on the word of the week episode.

Hey, I really appreciate that you listen to the word of the Week podcast.

If you have any questions about the podcast or about our church, Middletown Baptist Church, you can find more information about us on Facebook or YouTube, or you can find the podcast on nbcpodcast.org dot. You can contact me directly at Joshmissaro middletownbaptistchurch.org.

stay tuned for future word of the week episodes where we dive deeper into words that impact our life according to scripture. Thank you so much. God bless. We'll talk to you soon.