Who Is the Best Bible Teacher?
by Roger Pook
I love hearing a really anointed Bible teacher, someone who takes a well-known passage and draws out of it a revelation and significance that I never saw before, a ‘rightness’ that speaks deep into my spirit. And then a question arises in my mind: Why did I not see this before? Why could I not see beyond the superficial facts of the account into its deeper spiritual meaning?
The answer is quite simple, but in a way disturbing. The sad fact is that when we read and study the Bible, we usually try to understand it in the same way that we understand everything else, using our mind and our personal experience. But this limits our understanding! We see a superficial meaning, even something spiritual, and we are satisfied with that. We miss the deeper significance, and so we miss what God really wants to say to us.
Even if we pray before we read, our mind usually tries to take over and persuade us to be satisfied with the first thing that we see. So how can we find the deepest truths, the truths that will change our life?
The answer is to start with Jesus. He is the one who ‘opens our minds’ to receive the truth, just as he ‘opened their minds’ on the road to Emmaus. Start with the fact that the whole of Scripture points ultimately to Jesus, and work forward from that place, rather than trying to work back from your own understanding. Then ‘the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things’ (John 14:26).
What a promise! The best Bible teacher of all time will be right there with us! But we have to start with Jesus, who opens our minds.
Prayer: Thank You, Father, for opening the Scriptures to us by Your Holy Spirit. This is Your living word! And it all points to Your Son! Help me to start with this understanding every time I open these wonderful pages. I ask in Jesus' name. Amen.
Roger Pook For 21 years Roger Pook and his wife Christine served in Central and Eastern Europe, based in Hungary at the Úr Rétje centre of Ellel Ministries. From there they travelled and ministered across the length and breadth of the former communist world. In 2018 Roger retired as Regional Director and they now live back in the UK, where Roger still serves on the Executive Leadership and as a trustee of The Christian Trust. They still travel for the Kingdom!
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