How To Read the Bible

The nature of the Bible (also called “the Scripture” or “the Scriptures”) has long ago been described as follows:

“The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. Although the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God, as to leave men inexcusable; yet they are not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and His will which is necessary unto salvation. Therefore it pleased the Lord at sundry times and in diverse manners to reveal Himself, and to declare that His will unto His church; and afterward for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church against the corruption of the flesh, and the malice of Satan, and of the world, to commit the same wholly unto writing; which maketh the Holy Scriptures to be most necessary, those former ways of God’s revealing His will unto His people being now ceased.”

— The 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith, chapter 1, paragraph 1

In terms of its composition, the Bible is more like a library of books and writings from across history than it is a single book as we think of books today. There are 66 “books” in the Bible, 39 in the first part (called the “Old Testament”) and 27 in the second (called the “New Testament”) [1] — together written over a span of about 1,500 years (the earliest books written around 1400 B.C., and the latest book written sometime around A.D. 95).

The Old Testament books were mostly written to the ancestors of the Jewish people by their scribes and prophets under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (inspiration and the Spirit discussed in a later section). the major divisions of this section are often drawn in terms of law/history, wisdom/poetry, and prophecy. The Old Testament describes the history of the world (focusing on the ancestors of the Jewish people) from creation through to roughly 400 years or so before Jesus, when the Jewish people who had been exiled to Babylon were allowed to return and start rebuilding Jerusalem and the temple of God.

The New Testament books were written to a wide range of peoples, primarily by the Apostles (which means “messenger” or “sent one” — in this case referring to the 12 chosen disciples of Jesus who he commissioned to bear his authority in the establishing of the church) or close associates of the Apostles. It includes historical accounts of Jesus’ life and ministry, his death and resurrection, his ascension into heaven, and the establishment of the church and the spread of the gospel in those early years. It also includes many individual letters (usually in this context called “epistles”) written to various churches, pastors of churches, or individual believers.

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[1] Alternatively, if you count the five “books” of the Psalms as distinct, the total comes to 70 books in all, a much more biblically fitting number. However, this is not the traditional way of counting the books, so though this is my preference, I have only included it in this footnote so as to avoid needless confusion.

Some of the following categories can be nuanced a bit (e.g. Lamentations could be labeled both under the Prophets or under Poetry, and Job could be labeled both History and Wisdom/Poetry), but I’ve tried to group them in broad strokes here to give some conceptual framework to start with.

Each book will be presented in the following format…

• Name (author, approximate date it was written; short descriptor)

The books are listed in the order in which they appear in most English Bibles, but since that order was determined by genre we can also section off the list by genre here as well.

OLD TESTAMENT

History

• Genesis (Moses, 1445-1405 BC; Origins)

• Exodus (Moses, 1445-1405 BC; Deliverance of Israel)

• Leviticus (Moses, 1445-1405 BC; Law given to Israel)

• Numbers (Moses, 1445-1405 BC; Wilderness wandering)

• Deuteronomy (Moses, 1405 BC; Law reiterated)

• Joshua (Joshua[?], 1405-1385 BC; Conquest of Canaan)

• Judges (Samuel[?], 1043-1004 BC; Cycle of lawlessness)

• Ruth (Samuel[?], 1011-971 BC; Redemption)

• 1 Samuel (unknown, 931-722 BC; Man’s king for Israel)

• 2 Samuel (unknown, 931-722 BC; God’s king for Israel)

• 1 Kings (unknown, 561-538 BC; Kings of Israel/Judah)

• 2 Kings (unknown, 561-538 BC; Kings of Israel/Judah)

• 1 Chronicles (Ezra[?], 450-430 BC; King David)

• 2 Chronicles (Ezra[?], 450-430 BC; Kings of Israel/Judah)

• Ezra (Ezra[?], 457-444 BC; Return from exile)

• Nehemiah (Ezra[?], 446-400 BC; Rebuilding Jerusalem)

• Esther (unknown, 473-331 BC; Preservation and faith)

Wisdom/Poetry

• Job (unknown, unknown; Suffering)

• Psalms (David[+], 1400-400 BC; Living real life)

• Proverbs (Solomon[+], 971-686 BC; Way of wisdom)

• Ecclesiastes (Solomon, 971-931 BC; Life without God)

• Song of Solomon (Solomon, 971-931 BC; Pure marital love)

Prophecy

• Isaiah (Isaiah, 739-686 BC; Judgment and hope)

• Jeremiah (Jeremiah, 627-561 BC; Judgment and hope)

• Lamentations (Jeremiah, 586-583 BC; Lament for Jerusalem)

• Ezekiel (Ezekiel, 593-570 BC; God’s glory)

• Daniel (Daniel, 536-530 BC; God’s plans triumph)

• Hosea (Hosea, 755-710 BC; God’s love)

• Joel (Joel, 835-796 BC; The Day of the Lord)

• Amos (Amos, 790-760 BC; Justice and worship)

• Obadiah (Obadiah, 848-841 BC; God’s judgment)

• Jonah (Jonah, ~760 BC; God’s mercy)

• Micah (Micah, 735-710 BC; None like God)

• Nahum (Nahum, 695-642 BC; God’s judgment)

• Habakkuk (Habakkuk, ~609 BC; Just shall live by faith)

• Zephaniah (Zephaniah, 635-625 BC; The Day of the Lord)

• Haggai (Haggai, 520 BC; God’s dwelling place)

• Zechariah (Zechariah, 520-470 BC; Temple and Messiah)

• Malachi (Malachi, 433-424 BC; Broken covenant)

NEW TESTAMENT

Gospel (History)

• Matthew (Matthew, AD 50-70; Messiah has come)

• Mark (Mark [1], AD 50-60; Service and sacrifice)

• Luke (Luke, AD 60-61; Meticulous history)

• John (John, AD 80-90; Jesus the Son of God)

History

• Acts (Luke, AD 60-62; Spread of the gospel)

Letters (Epistles)

• Romans (Paul, AD 56; Righteousness)

• 1 Corinthians (Paul, AD 55; Behavioral correction)

• 2 Corinthians (Paul, AD 55; Comfort and care)

• Galatians (Paul, AD 49-50; Justification by faith)

• Ephesians (Paul, AD 60-62; Encouragement)

• Philippians (Paul, AD 61; Practical guidance)

• Colossians (Paul, AD 60-62; Key doctrines)

• 1 Thessalonians (Paul, AD 51; Eschatology & gospel)

• 2 Thessalonians (Paul, AD 51-52; Eschatology & truth)

• 1 Timothy (Paul, AD 62-64; Pastoral instruction)

• 2 Timothy (Paul, AD 66-67; Be strong in the Word)

• Titus (Paul, AD 62-64; Pastoral instruction)

• Philemon (Paul, AD 60-62; Runaway slave)

• Hebrews (unknown, AD 67-69; Christ our High Priest)

• James (James [2], AD 44-49; Obedient faith)

• 1 Peter (Peter, AD 64-65; Living victoriously)

• 2 Peter (Peter, AD 67-68; Against false teachers)

• 1 John (John, AD 90-95; Back to the basics)

• 2 John (John, AD 90-95; Back to the basics)

• 3 John (John, AD 90-95; Christian hospitality)

• Jude (Jude [3], AD 68-70; Against false teachers)

Prophecy (Epistle)

• Revelation (John, AD 94-96; Final victory of Christ)

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[1] Also referred to as “John Mark” — it is likely that the Apostle Peter directed Mark’s writing of this gospel.

[2] The brother of Jesus, not the Apostle James.

[3] The brother of Jesus, not the Apostle Jude/Judas, nor the Betrayer, Judas Iscariot.

Various other Christian traditions (e.g. Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox churches, etc.) have included varying sets of other books as belonging to the Bible. Most of these are from the period between the OT and NT, with some providing useful historical accounts of that time. However, few in the early centuries of the church believed them to be inspired, and it was not until the Council of Trent (sixteenth century) that Rome declared these books to be inspired; beyond this, these books have been proven erroneous and contradictory on many points [1]. Thus, they are not included in most Bibles today outside the Roman and Eastern churches.

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[1] https://www.gotquestions.org/apocrypha-deuterocanonical.html, retrieved 2024-11-07.

We believe that the Bible is what we call the “inspired” word of God. “Inspired” comes from the same root as “expire” or “respiration” — it means to be “breathed out” by God. The usage of the word comes from Paul’s second letter to his protege Timothy, which says,

“All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be equipped, having been thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

— 2 Timothy 3:16-17

Do we mean that God has physical lungs with which he breathes out paper and ink? No, rather it captures the idea that these are words from God, he is the one that spoke these words through the human authors of the individual books, as truly so as if he had breathed out the words himself.

One consequence of this belief, along with the belief that God cannot lie and cannot err [1], is that his word, in the original manuscripts, is entirely truthful and without error (terms used for this are “inerrant” and “infallible” — technically not synonymous, but I will mostly just use the term “inerrant” for the concept here). While going into the discussion of manuscript transmission and how we get our modern copies of the Bible in hundreds if not thousands of translations across languages is outside the scope of this paper [2], it is nevertheless important to recognize that the translations we have today are based on very thorough manuscript evidence that gives an extremely high degree of confidence (even among secular scholars who deny that the Bible is the word of God) that what we have is a pretty near spot-on representation of the words of the original documents.

Other documents — of church creeds and councils, histories, letters and writings of the early church Fathers, etc. — are helpful in documenting what occurred and what was believed in times past, but do not share the inspired attribute of Scripture, and therefore also do not share its inerrancy. Thus, such documents are put beneath the authority of Scripture. This is called the doctrine of “sola Scriptura” — Latin for “Scripture alone” — which teaches that in this age [3] Scripture alone is the final and inerrant authority on all matters on which it speaks.

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[1] Titus 1:2, Numbers 23:19, 2 Timothy 4.

[2] See https://www.gotquestions.org/Bible-inerrancy.html as a potential starting point down that rabbit hole.

[3] Though in times past there were prophets sent from God, direct appearances of God, etc., in this present Church age these ways of God communicating to us have ceased, and so the Scriptures are the only remaining direct revelation from God to us.

The Bible is the (true historical) story of what God has done, his revelation of what he is doing, and what he has shown his prophets about what he will do in the future. It is the story of how in the fullness of time God the Son took on flesh, becoming a man, living the perfect life we could not, dying the death and suffering the wrath of God our sins deserve, and rising again in victory over sin and death, the firstfruits of the resurrection of the dead; all so that those who confess him as Lord and believe in him can be saved through the atonement that has been bought through his blood.

For a more in-depth synopsis of the whole Bible, I recommend the following resource: What is the Bible about? Can you give me an overview of the Bible? | GotQuestions.org.

So what is the point of all this? The point is to tell of God’s work in and through his creation, with the focal point being the gospel (“good news”) of Jesus Christ. Now that you have the context of what the Bible is, and the overall summary, let’s take a focused look at what the gospel is. (If you skipped ahead to this section, it might be good to go back and read the other ones first, then come back here.)

First, we speak of the holiness and supremacy of God over all things. He is the creator and owner of everything. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). Psalm 24:1 builds on that by saying, “The earth is Yahweh’s [1], as well as its fullness, the world, and those who dwell in it.” He is perfectly holy without any fault: “Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). As that verse alludes to, and others back up, he requires perfect obedience: “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all” (James 2:10).

Second, as a consequence of the holiness of God and the high standard of obedience required by the holiness of God, all of mankind is guilty. “As it is written, ‘there is none righteous, not even one; there is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God […] for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:10-11,23). The just penalty for this sin is eternal death: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23). Our own good works are insufficient to save us from the guilt of our sin: “[God] saved us, not by works which we did in righteousness, but according to His mercy, through the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5).

Third, as you probably picked up on from the verses cited above, there is a way to be saved from eternal death due to us as a result of our sin: Jesus Christ the Savior. He is the one who is both God and sinless man: “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells bodily” (Colossians 2:8-9). He paid sin’s penalty on the cross: “But God demonstrated His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). “[God] made [Jesus] who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21). He died on a Roman cross, was buried, rose from the dead on the third day, and is alive: “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4).

Fourth, a response is demanded by these things: repent of sin and believe in Jesus, or stay in sin and therefore under the just wrath of God. “Seek Yahweh while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to Yahweh, and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon” (Isaiah 55:6-7). “And [Jesus] was saying to them all, ‘If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me’” (Luke 9:23). “[I]f you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, leading to righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, leading to salvation” (Romans 10:9-10). “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now commanding men that everyone everywhere should repent” (Acts 17:30).

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[1] “YHWH” (the “Tetragrammaton”) is the covenant name of God, given in Exodus 3. Due to how ancient Hebrew was written without vowels, and how the Jews do not speak the name of God for fear of blaspheming, we do not know for sure what vowels go with the consonants above, but “Yahweh” is the most likely option based on the relationship between the Name and ancient forms of the Hebrew verb “to be" (i.e. the way God refers to himself in Exodus 3:14 as “I AM WHO I AM”).

I intend to add more extensive information at some point in answer to this question, but I’ll mention a few fundamentals for now…

1. Read it as normal language! It is not a mystical text with encoded secrets (e.g. “every fifth letter spells out a secret message”) or anything like that. The books of the Bible were inspired by the Spirit, yes, but they were inspired by the Spirit as normal language written by real people to real other people who were expected to understand what was being written to them via the normal rules of language. So when trying to understand a given passage, make sure you are (1) using a faithful and quality translation — better yet, compare multiple translations to get a better sense of what the underlying original language might have meant, if it doesn’t map one-to-one to English — and (2) following the normal rules of grammar — verbs, nouns, etc. — and deriving the meaning of the text from those nouns, verbs, etc. Don’t read into the text some meaning that is not contained in the language of the text understood in context.

2. Read it in context! Don’t read poetry like it’s history, or history like it’s poetry. Don’t read Jeremiah talking to Israel as if he’s talking to you in the church age today. Work to understand the historical context in which and to which the text was originally written, and that will help you understand the author’s intent.

3. Read it as part of the whole! The Bible was written through human authors, but ultimately its author is God. He orchestrated the whole thing as a unified message, so when you run into a passage that is difficult to understand, seek out related passages that are easier to understand and use those as a starting point for helping narrow down what the more difficult text might be saying and what it cannot be saying, because God will not contradict himself. Some things will be hard to understand, and it’s okay to make a note of that passage and come back to it later. Focus first on picking up the main points that are easier to grasp, and then wrestling through the more difficult things later once you have a grasp of the fundamentals.

4. Don’t read it in isolation! Find a good Study Bible or two, join a faithful Bible-teaching local church that teaches the Bible along the lines of the principles discussed above, study the Bible with others who have followed Jesus faithfully for years and decades longer than you have and learn from their insights. A couple resources I would recommend are the MacArthur Study Bible (available in hard copy from many online stores, but also available as “The Study Bible” app on both Android and Apple) and the free study notes available with the online NET Bible.

You can start at the beginning, the book of Genesis, making your way book-by-book all the way to Revelation, and that’s fine, but you might get discouraged trying to make it through all the dense and seemingly unrelated material that fills many of the early books before you get to stuff that talks about Jesus and being a follower of him. It would be kind of like wanting to understand why the American Colonies rebelled against England in the 1700’s, and starting with the history of the Roman occupation of Britain in 43 AD. For a full understanding, is it important to start from the beginning? Eventually, yes. But just like you probably shouldn’t try making sourdough from scratch the first time you bake bread, there are better ways to start out on your study of the Bible.

This is the itinerary I would recommend for introducing yourself to the Bible for the first time:

1. Read Genesis. This will give you the beginning of the story, the foundation of all that comes later throughout human history. Don’t worry if you get confused by the long genealogies or unfamiliar cultural practices. Just read through it start to finish for exposure to the big picture of it, focusing on what God is revealing about himself and his workings, and paying attention to characters like Adam, Noah, Abraham, Jacob/Israel, and Judah.

2. Read Acts 7:2-53. This is a speech given by a man named Stephen, a follower of Jesus, which gives a high-level summary of portions of Genesis, and much of the main points of what happened between Genesis and the coming of Jesus.

3. Read the Gospel of John. The Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), the first four books of the New Testament, are the accounts of Jesus’ life, ministry, death, and resurrection. The Gospel as recorded by John is a good introduction to Jesus as the Son of God and the Savior, though if you have time I would encourage you to read the other accounts as well, which add additional detail and perspectives on many of the events of Jesus’ life.

4. Read Acts. This gives an account of how the Church was established by the coming of the Holy Spirit, and how it grew and spread and developed over the course of the first 50 years or so after Jesus’ ascension into Heaven.

5. Read 1 John. This is a letter from John (the same one who wrote the Gospel of John and was the “disciple whom Jesus loved”) to Christians (followers of Jesus) in the early Church. This gives some of the basic truths of Christianity.

From there, for the New Testament just reading it start to finish is fine (though do note that without a thorough understanding of the Old Testament, especially the Prophets, the book of Revelation is going to be pretty challenging to follow), or you could read it in the order the books were written (referencing the dates I provided in an earlier section).

The Old Testament is a bit more challenging, because many of the Prophets as well as much of the book of Psalms need to be read interspersed with and often in the middle of the historical books to be understood in context. For this reason, a resource like the ESV Chronological Bible might be useful in reading through the Old Testament, or you can just read it start to finish bit by bit, since doing so will give you the historical books before you get into any of the Prophets. A study Bible like the MacArthur Study Bible is especially recommended for the Prophets, as the notes will help you link much of what is being said to historical context and other relevant details.

“Where there is no guidance the people fall, but in abundance of counselors there is salvation.”

— Proverbs 11:14

Study Bibles…

• The MacArthur Study Bible (Amazon, GTY, mobile app)

• Grace & Truth Study Bible (Amazon)

• The NET Bible (free online, print edition: Amazon)

• ESV Study Bible (Amazon)

• Ryrie Study Bible (Amazon)

Other Books…

• The Essential Scriptures, Kevin Zuber (Amazon)

• Because the Time is Near, John MacArthur (Amazon)

• What the Bible Says About Israel, Cliff McManis (Amazon)

• Understanding Genesis, Jason Lisle (Amazon)

• One Lord, One Plan, One People, Rodger Crooks (Amazon)

• Bible Knowledge Commentary, ed. Walvoord & Zuck (Amazon)

• The Moody Bible Commentary, ed. Rydelnik & Vanlaningham (Amazon)

• 2000 Years of Christ’s Power, Nick Needham (Amazon: vol1, vol2, vol3, vol4, vol5)

Other Helpful Resources…

• GotQuestions.org

• Masters Seminary Church Finder

• Other Church Finders

• Bible Timeline | Answers in Genesis

• With All Wisdom (Our Mission)