Skip to content ↓

Why the Bible Is Hard to Understand—and What You Can Do About It

Sponsored Collection cover image

This sponsored post was prepared by Professors J. Scott Duvall and J. Daniel Hays on behalf of Zondervan Academic Online Courses.

It’s common for Christians to say they’ve read the Bible their whole lives. But many don’t completely understand what large portions of the Scriptures mean.

3 Bible reading mistakes

Without help, it can be easy to miss out on what the Bible is really saying.

  • Many of us approach the Bible with an intuitive or “feels right” approach. We read the text and conclude what we’re thinking or feeling at the time.
  • Other times we used a spiritualized approach. We want to force the details of the Bible to provide a spiritual lesson for us—and nothing more.
  • Sometimes we just give up.

Does this sound like you?

If we believe that the Bible is God’s Word, then it’s important to learn how to read it well. But this is no small task.

How you can read the Bible better

For years, we watched our students struggle to read the Bible.

Danny had been teaching the Interpreting the Bible class for a few years at Ouachita Baptist University and couldn’t find a satisfactory textbook. Scott suggested that we write one.

We agreed that we needed a book that was more than a simple introduction to Bible study—but not a book that only dealt with highly complex issues of advanced hermeneutics. We wanted to challenge students—but not confuse and discourage them.

We wanted a book that:

  • engaged students with clear explanations,
  • provided plenty of examples from the Bible itself, and
  • gave them hands-on exercises so students could learn by doing.

We wrote Grasping God’s Word over a couple of years with plenty of field testing with our own students to make sure it was just the kind of book that would meet this practical need.

From this book, and from our teaching experience at Ouachita, we developed a course—and now this course is available online for everyone.

We hope it’s as helpful to you as it’s been to the thousands of students who have taken our classes at Ouachita over the years.

The best part is that we are making the first part of this course available for free.

Here is what you will learn in just the first hour:

  • How we got our English Bible
  • What the major translations are and how they differ
  • Approaches to Bible translations
  • Why literal Bible translations aren’t always more accurate
  • How we can be certain that the Bible is really God’s Word
  • Four guidelines for choosing a translations

The course contains a four-part structure:

  1. The overview gives you an overarching view of the key content. It includes high-quality video lectures to guide you through the material.
  2. The study page gives you the opportunity to dive deep into the material. Personal reflection questions interspersed throughout the readings will cause you to stop and contemplate the material before moving on.
  3. The review pages teach you concepts from the unit and keep track of how well you know each concept. You will begin to apply what you learn to actual passages from the Bible.
  4. The assessment page provides you the opportunity to demonstrate your mastery of the unit’s content.

Remember, it costs nothing to sign up for the first section of the course.

Get started today!

There is nothing like being able to read God’s word for yourself. This free course offers you a clear and concise framework to get started. In only one hour, you’ll know all the basics.

Sign up now!

Sponsored


  • The Phrase that Altered My Thinking Forever

    This week the blog is sponsored by P&R Publishing and is written by Ralph Cunnington. Years ago, I stumbled repeatedly on an ancient phrase that altered my thinking forever.  Distinct yet inseparable. The first time I encountered this phrase was while studying the Council of Chalcedon’s description of the two natures of Christ. Soon after,…

  • Always Look for the Light

    Always Look for the Light

    For many years there was a little potted plant on our kitchen window sill, though I’ve long since forgotten the variety. Year after year that plant would put out a shoot and from the shoot would emerge a single flower. And I observed that no matter how I turned the pot, the flower would respond.…

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    A La Carte (March 18)

    A La Carte: God is good and does good—even in our pain / Dear bride and groom / Sin won’t comfort you / Worthy of the gospel / From self-sufficiency to trusting God’s people / The gods fight for our devotion / and more.

  • Confidence

    God Takes Us Into His Confidence

    Here is another Sunday devotional—a brief thought to orient your heart toward the Lord. God takes the initiative in establishing relationship by reaching out to helpless humanity. He reveals himself to the creatures he has made. But what does it mean for him to provide such revelation of himself? John Calvin began his Institutes by…

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    Weekend A La Carte (March 16)

    A La Carte: I believe in the death of Julius Caesar and the resurrection of Jesus Christ / Reasons students and pastors shouldn’t use ChatGPT / A 1.3 gigpixel photo of a supernova / What two raw vegans taught me about sharing Jesus / If we realize we’re undeserving, suddenly the world comes alive /…

  • Ask Pastor John

    Ask Pastor John

    I admit it: I felt a little skeptical about Ask Pastor John. To be fair, I feel skeptical about most books that begin in one medium before making the leap to another. Books based on sermons, for example, can often be pretty disappointing—a powerful sermon at a conference can make a bland chapter in a…