Picture this: You want to make your pastor a chocolate cake. But in this imaginary world, you have never made a chocolate cake. So you walk into the kitchen and start baking! You grab a pan that looks about the right size. You look in the pantry and pick out some ingredients that seem like they should go in cake. Then you start pouring them into the mixer. You are not exactly sure what temperature the oven should be set to, so you pick on that looks appropriate. Then you throw the cake in and hope for the best!
How might this cake come out? No idea! It might come out amazing, or it might come out awful. Chances are, assuming the randomness and un-deliberateness of it all, it will likely not taste very good. Your pastor will thank you for the cake with a big smile on his face, but that smile will turn to a frown when it tries the first piece.
Why am I talking about cake? Because this is representative of how many of you (and I) “study” the word of God.
So often we open up the Bible and just “start.” We start reading without much thought, preparation, or study… sort of like how you just made me that cake!
I know we all live busy lives. We have places to go and people to see. We have jobs to get to, kids to take care of, and tasks to accomplish. So we think that if we simply make time to read the Bible, we are doing well. But in that compromise, you may be sabotaging your devotional time!
Think of it in terms of investing: Is it good that you save money each month? Yes! But what if the next month you remove the money from your account that you had just deposited the month prior? It won’t help much! Saving money works best when it sits and accumulates, growing both in principal and interest.
Your devotional time is the same. Is it great that you stop and read the Bible? Yes! But what if you quickly read it, put it down, and forget it? That is like saving money and then withdrawing it the next month. You will gain so much more if you will let that Bible sit in you and grow.
One of the ways you can do this is by having a study Bible. Let me give you several reasons why:
1) Study Bibles answer questions we have about the text.
This has probably happened to you: You read something in the Bible that makes you think, “I wonder why he said that!” The problem is that you have no idea how to find out the answer. So you move on and later forget what you were wondering about.
The beauty of having a study Bible is that you don’t have to wonder, you can find out right then! A good study Bible will answer a lot of the “I wonder…” questions you have. Will it answer every question you have? No. But it will answer a lot more than if you had no study Bible at all!
2) Study Bibles make you dig deeper.
Maybe it’s just me, but when I have my study bible open and in front of me, I feel more studious! It’s like I WANT to dig more into the text. So when I begin having my devotional time I start doing what I am feeling: I study the Bible more!
Perhaps it is because you know there are many answers just below the text. Whereas on a regular Bible (or phone) you know there are no answers around, so you simply read; but when you have the study Bible right there you are more tempted to ask questions and look more deeply.
3) Study Bibles keep you focused on the original intent.
It is very easy to misunderstand a passage of scripture. This, in turn, can lead to misapplying scripture. While study Bibles are not perfect, a good one will have a lot of smart people behind the writing and be able to lead you more accurately through difficult parts of the Bible. This helps you not make wrong interpretations.
In a way, having a good study Bible is sort of like bowling with the rails up. You have freedom to bounce around, but you are at least headed in the right direction!
While there are a lot of good study Bibles out there, my favorite is the ESV Study Bible. It is a great balance of good information without being too much. It has some excellent notes below the passages as well as helpful introductions to each book of the Bible. It also has some great articles throughout about important topics and themes that come up. So give it a try and let me know what you think!