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In Christ, Mark
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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, “Go south to the road—the desert road—that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” So he started out, and on his way he met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of the Kandake (which means “queen of the Ethiopians”). This man had gone to Jerusalem to worship, and on his way home was sitting in his chariot reading the Book of Isaiah the prophet. The Spirit told Philip, “Go to that chariot and stay near it.”
Then Philip ran up to the chariot and heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. “Do you understand what you are reading?” Philip asked.
“How can I,” he said, “unless someone explains it to me?” So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.
This is the passage of Scripture the eunuch was reading:
“He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before its shearer is silent, so He did not open his mouth. In his humiliation, He was deprived of justice. Who can speak of His descendants? For His life was taken from the earth.”
The eunuch asked Philip, “Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?”
Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.
Acts 8:16-35
This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
Today’s message is an extension of yesterday’s devotion as we looked at how an Ethiopian official traveling home from a time in worship received divine understanding through his God-orchestrated encounter with Philip who began with the passage from Isaiah that the official was reading and shared the Gospel of Jesus with him.
As I meditated on that message after its completion, I felt led by the Holy Spirit to write a companion message and share ways I use to find and gain divine understanding as I do my own study in preparation for teaching, preaching on occasion, and writing devotions. I want to offer you five different options that can help you as they help me. They include:
1. Prayer.
This is always the best place to start if you’re looking to gain divine guidance. We always should be connecting to and communing with the Lord, asking for His help in gaining understanding of the scriptures and anything else in life for that matter. He’s always available and ready to lead and guide us toward being the people He wants us to be and He wants us to be knowledgeable in regard to His word so we can serve Him properly and help other come to know and trust Him themselves.
Through prayer, the Lord always equips us with what we need.
2. Good study bible with footnotes.
The Ethiopian official and all other biblical figures engaged in scriptural study didn’t have the tools we have at our disposal today more than 2,000 years later.
Today, we have a buffet table full of options when it comes to the types of bibles we can acquire. I always recommend getting a good study bible, one with lots of footnotes that expound on the scripture verses you read. You pay a little more for them but it’s worth the expense as they help you gain greater divine understanding of God’s word.
3. Different bible translations.
When I say there are a lot of different bibles available today, the differences just don’t come in the way of format. You also have a bevy of translations to choose from.
How do you know which one is best?
I’ve heard a lot of people profess trust in one translation and one translation only but in my experience, there is truth found across different translations when you read the same verse interpreted by several different sources. I have one predominant translation I prefer personally and I think everyone should find the one that best provides them divine understanding but one should never discount the value of comparing different translations, one against the other, to aid in comprehension.
Of interest, there are many types of parallel bibles available where companies have already taken as many as four different translations and formatted the bible pages to show all four translations side by side, verse by verse. They can be very helpful to have to enhance your bible study.
4. Commentaries.
There have been quite a few people blessed through the years with the gift of expounding on passages in the bible and compiling those expositions into what is known as bible commentaries. Many of these are now available online which saves a person from having to purchase them. I use them quite frequently when I am working on difficult parts of the bible and trying to write or teach the meaning to others.
5. The power of the Holy Spirit.
This could have been easily number one or two but I put the Holy Spirit here because he is the one who always pulls things together. I can pray, consult my study bible and multiple translations, and seek additional guidance from commentaries but in the end, the Holy Spirit takes all this collective knowledge and puts it into the form that the Lord wants, the form He wants me to write, the form He wants me to speak.
Ultimately, divine understanding always translates to divine teaching and preaching because the very truth of God Himself is being written or spoken. He provides the words and we become instruments of transmission for those words, just like the prophets of old and just like Philip as he not only explained the words of the prophet to the Ethiopian official but provided so much more as he shared the gospel message.
How would the Ethiopian official respond to receiving the divine understanding he so hungered for?
We’ll see in tomorrow’s message. I hope you’ll check back in then.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please
share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.
Send any prayer requests to Gods4all@aol.com
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