Our purpose at the Omega Institute is to help the believer understand and appreciate the doctrines of Scripture in a way he or she can truly digest and apply. This series of devotionals cover the spectrum of Evangelical biblical doctrine in such a way that the Christian can meditate each week on a different truth from Scripture so as to master the essentials and better know and serve his or her Lord.
Key Verse(s):
“2And according to Paul's custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, 3explaining and giving evidence that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, ‘This Jesus whom I am proclaiming to you is the Christ.’ ” —Acts 17:2-3
Theology can be rather intimidating at times, especially when theologians start pulling out ten dollar words rooted in either Latin or Greek. It almost seems that the technical language of Scripture is something that smart people make hard to understand to prove that they are smart.
This could not be further from the truth, however. We need to remember that men and women began to study the Scriptures as long as there has been Scripture. Since the task of theology is to unpack the truths contained within the pages of Scripture, it has been the task of the church to do what Scripture tells us the apostles did in presenting the truths of God’s Word to unbelievers they preached it to: “and according to Paul’s custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead …” (Acts 17:2, 3) That is our task as the Church of Jesus Christ: to understand and explain to others what the Bible has to say to us. Because the Scriptures are an inspired compilation of sixty-six books, and it speaks to many topics in many places, the importance of taking what the Bible has to say about any subject and making sure that it is in harmony with the whole is critical to knowing God and speaking of Him what is right.
It is tempting nowadays to read a passage of Scripture, whether it is a verse, series of verses, or a chapter (s) and decide what we think the text is saying. However, the task of theology is to first exegete the passage properly. This English word comes from a Greek word found in the gospel of John (1:18) where the author speaks about the way God the Son reveals God the Father: we know the Father through knowing the Son. John says that while no one has ever seen the Father as He is, the only begotten God (namely, the Son) has exegeted him (made Him known). The word literally means to “draw out” the meaning of something rather than read into it. We experience this all the time in real life and in real relationships – how many times do we assume what someone is doing or why they are doing it; or what someone really meant by what they said in a conversation? We do not know their mind on the subject completely, nor do we always have the facts to understand that they were intending when they said or did something – but we fill in the blanks (often with our own prejudices, desires, etc.) and content ourselves with the fact that we have read the situation correctly. This is exactly what Job’s friends did in trying to figure out why the Almighty would have allowed such calamity to befall this great man of God. If you read the cycles of speeches from these friends, you will find that much of what they say sounds very good and very right – however, at the end of the book, we read:
“It came about after the LORD had spoken these words to Job, that the LORD said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “My wrath is kindled against you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of Me what is right as My servant Job has.”
Job 42:7
God cares deeply about how He is represented to others; that His character and His works are both understood and conveyed to people rightly. This is the task of theology – and it is not a job reserved for a special class of clergy as the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox churches would claim: the truth of Scripture can be known by the “common man” as long as he or she is diligent to study to show himself approved to God, a workman that does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing (interpreting) the Word of truth. (see: 2 Timothy 2:15) Exegesis involves considering things like the context of the passage, parallel passages that relate to the same subject (so that your understanding of a section of Scripture harmonizes with the rest of the Bible), the original language, the culture and the people to whom the passage was originally written, etc. This kind of diligence and hard work is what the Bible itself demands of us to draw out God’s intended meaning rather than insert ours into the Bible.
Once we have rightly understood the passage, we then compare other passages which speak of the same subject and compile this information into a meaningful whole. These various subjects of theology (called branches) cover the whole gamut of what the Bible talks about: God, Christ, Holy Spirit, salvation, the church, last things, angels and demons, the Scriptures, etc.
There are other ways of arranging these topics as well as systematically (described above): some have studied the material belonging to a specific Biblical author or the material in a specific testament (Biblical theology), some have applied theology to ministry (Pastoral theology), some have studied what the church has believed through the centuries at various points (Historical Theology). While these approaches are certainly more than is required of the man or woman in the pew, we need to keep in mind that every man is a theologian. Just listen in to conversations about God and the Bible and you will find that everyone has opinions about what the Bible has to say about _________. Our task is to make sure that our answers correspond to what God has said in His Word.
—Larry Carrino
