Morgan Teruel: Welcome to the Sandals church podcast. My name is McKay Vandenberg and I'm part of the online team here at Sandals church. We are so happy to have you join us today. As we listen to pastor Fredo Ramos teaching on the spiritual discipline of reading scripture. If you've enjoyed our content, we would love for you to rate this podcast to help it reach more people.
But for now, let's hear from pastor Fredo.
Fredo Ramos: We are all becoming someone. In fact, one of the best questions that you can ask yourself is who am I becoming? And for those of us who follow Jesus, we refer to this as spiritual formation, which is a way to describe the process of becoming more like Jesus. So that if you want to become like Him, then you need to consider doing the things that Jesus himself did. And so today, I want to talk to you about the practice of reading scripture.
Now I would define the Bible or scripture as a library of writings that are both divine and human that tell a unifying story that lead us to Jesus. And when I say a library of writings, what I mean is you would approach the Bible not just as a book, but the same way you would approach going to the library, so that when you walk in, you consider what kind of authors are you reading, what time period are you in, what genre of literature are you in, so that we just don't read the Bible literally, but we read the Bible literarily. Meaning, we take it seriously for what it's saying, but we allow the kind of literature to inform how we're reading it. Secondly, it's written by both God and man. Jesus himself pointed this out in Mark chapter 12 when he said, David speaking by the Holy Spirit, and then he goes on to cite Psalm 110.
So in Jesus' mind, the scriptures come to us from God through human authors. And this is not a dirty little secret we're trying to hide. We're very honest that it speaks both to, how God gave it to us and how humans did through their various time periods and with their various personalities. We also see this in the writings of Paul. In second Timothy chapter 3, Paul himself said that all scripture is God breathed, and it's useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness so that the servant of God may be fully equipped for every good work.
Meaning the goal of reading the Bible is not for you to feel right about yourself, to feel validated in your way of life. The goal of reading the Bible is not even for you to weaponize it against other people, but to allow the scriptures to read you. We get into the Bible so that the Bible can get into us and really transform us to allow us to become fully equipped. And they're not just a library of writings given to us by both God and man, but they tell a unifying story that leads us to Jesus. Again, Jesus himself in Luke chapter 4, when he's quoting from Isaiah, quotes this old poem from the 8th century BC, and he says, today this has been fulfilled in your hearing.
So any part of scripture Jesus sees as a story in search of its ending, and the ending is him. We see this elsewhere when he's teaching his disciples that what Moses and the law says, what the prophets have been saying all point to me. And so it's unhealthy for us to approach reading the Bible as a bunch of disconnected stories, but to rather see them as one unifying story that leads us to him. In fact, it can be dangerous to expect every part that you're reading to have a beautiful little bow at the end of it with a great little more moral teaching like, listen to your parents or don't do this. Right?
But it tells a story about reality, about God, and about the the way that humans live and operate that ultimately reveal us to Jesus. And that's in part why I trust the scriptures. Really, that's in part why I mainly trust the scriptures. In other words, I don't trust Jesus because I trust the Bible. No.
I trust the Bible because I trust in Jesus, and he has seen it as valuable and trustworthy for life, and so will I. He acts, lives, and speaks as if the Bible is trustworthy, and so my life will be shaped by that very thing. Even if that means I don't always get the answers I want, or if I come to the certain conclusion, or have some answers that are just not popular in today's world. And so with that, I wanna give you the practice of how to do this with what's called lectio divina. It's latin for spiritual reading.
And it first invites you to be still and to go slow. To remember that reading the bible is a relational act with a book that is living and active, and you're connecting with God. So go slow in the way that you would go slow in a conversation with someone and be present to them as they speak to you. So much of learning to read scripture is you relearning how to actually listen again. Secondly, take a short portion of it.
We are so conditioned in our modern world to take in so much information that it begins to deform the way we read scripture. So my encouragement to you would be to go slow and take in less and allow yourself to dive deeper into less scripture. And then thirdly, what stands out? What jumped out to you? What really resonated?
And then think about how might that apply to your life? Do you have a gap that that portion of scripture is revealing to you? And then 5thly, talk back to God. It's often referred to as devotion. So speak to God what you hear him speaking to you.
The way I do this in my life is sometimes I'll say, Jesus, today I hear you telling me this, and then I'll fill in the blank with whatever I feel like he's telling me. And so I allow reading scripture to actually become a pathway and a doorway into prayer and communion with God. And And with all these practices, I would say this, especially when it comes to reading the Bible, posture is far more important than technique. Meaning, we come to scripture ready to yield, ready to surrender, ready to be open to God, to allow him to speak to us so that we would not hear Jesus tell us what he told the Pharisees in the gospel of John, where he said, my word has no room in you. So much of reading the Bible is about making room for the words of Jesus to nourish you.
For Jesus himself said that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Your life, if you're going to live what you desire to live, must be nourished by the words of Jesus. And so let me ask you, does your life right now have room for his words? If so, be open as you surrender and yield yourself to his words because ultimately, Jesus first yielded himself in his life for you. We simply follow in his footsteps.
He surrendered himself for the sake of us. Now in turn, every day we come to scripture ready to surrender ourselves for his sake. Grace and peace. How was the time on that first one? 11 minutes.
11 minutes? Good night, Thomas. It was all so good though. Yeah. I wouldn't I
Morgan Teruel: Thank you so much for tuning in today. If you want more content from the series, we have the YouTube playlist linked in the description. And if you want more information about who we are and what we do, you can go to sandalschurch.com.