Bible Basics

Today on Renewing Your Mind, a special conversation with Stephen Nichols. One of the questions we often forget to ask is, what is this text teaching me about God? And as we understand who God is, that helps us understand who we are and where we fit into his grand scheme.

So, we cannot be God-centered enough and God-focused enough. The Bible is a book like no other. Studying it can be a daunting task for a new believer.

And for a seasoned saint, there are enough riches to mine it for a lifetime. Stephen Nichols is president of Reformation Bible College, and he is a Ligonier Ministries teaching fellow. You've heard him on Renewing Your Mind before, and if you listen to five minutes in church history, you hear him every week while he has written a helpful new book designed to introduce the new Christian to the contours, structures, and themes of the Bible, and to quickly and simply reinforce those foundational truths for the mature saint. I was able to sit down with Dr. Nichols to talk about this new book, Bible Basics, and discuss some of the key themes of Scripture.

Before you hear that conversation, today only, you can request your own hardcover copy of Bible Basics when you give a donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org. Well, here's my conversation with Stephen Nichols. Dr. Nichols, it's great to have you with us today on Renewing Your Mind. Yeah, I'm looking forward to this time with you, Nathan.

Thanks for having me. Now, as we're sitting in the studio, we have just returned from Phoenix, Arizona, for Always Ready. And by the time our listeners hear this conversation, Lord willing, we will have returned from Canada. Can you remind our listeners what Always Ready is and why it's important to reach the next generation?

Yeah, these events are wonderful, and it's such a privilege to go out with you and reach out to the next generation. This is probably one of our most important next generation initiatives to come alongside of 12 to 18-year-olds who are navigating very tricky waters these days and have very difficult questions coming at them. We want them to see that there's a place where they can find answers for those questions. They don't have to run from the questions or cave into these questions of identity or, can I trust the Bible or is Jesus the only way?

Really crucial questions. We just come alongside, help them see where they can find answers in the Bible, and hopefully have confidence in their faith, not only for their own sake, but also to share the faith. And I know you've commented on it, just how wonderful it is to see them all together, you know, whether it's 500 in a room or 1,000 in a room of teenagers singing hymns together, looking at God's Word together.

It's encouraging for us, and we just trust it's encouraging for them and for their families. Well, I asked you to come into the studio today, Dr. Nichols, because of a book that was released last year that you penned called Bible Basics, and this is another resource to help the next generation. I know as I read this, I was thinking, I wish I had this when I was a new Christian. Our listeners know I didn't grow up in a Christian home, so being a teenager, becoming a Christian, I didn't have the Bible Basics. I didn't understand really how to navigate the Scriptures. So this is a really helpful resource to introduce people to the basics of the Bible, the key structures of Scripture, and the Christian life. But this book isn't just for new Christians. Why is it important for all of us, even a seasoned believer, to go back to those foundational truths of the faith?

Yeah, the basics are so crucial. You know, we could go right to Martin Luther, and of course, Luther's always good for a quote, but at one time he said, Though I am a great doctor, I have not yet progressed beyond the instruction of children in the Ten Commandments, the Apostles' Creed, and the Lord's Prayer. I still learn and pray these every day with my Hans and my little Lena. Of course, these are two of Luther's children.

Sadly, Lena, that he references there, will die as a 12-year-old. But this is Luther in the morning, going through what becomes his kinder catechismus, his child's catechism, of focusing in on the Ten Commandments, which is, of course, ethics, the Apostles' Creed, which is basic doctrine, and then the Lord's Prayer, which is both doctrine and prayer, and that link then to sanctification. So here's Luther, incredibly educated, just a brilliant figure, and he's saying how important the basics are in our Christian life. Now, Dr. Nichols, you did grow up in the church. How was growing up in the church and your experience in local churches, as well as in the classroom as a teacher?

You teach here at Reformation Bible College, as our listeners know. How have those experiences shaped your vision for this particular title? You know, when I think about teaching, I think two things. I think, what do I want my students to know, and who do I want my students to be? Those are sort of the two things I aim at. And, you know, you start thinking about what I want my students to know, whatever the class is, you come up with your list, and it can get a little unwieldy, and there can be a lot of elements to it. And then you begin to say, well, what are they going to take away with them?

What are going to be those basics or those crucial pieces? Well, now that helps me really hone in. I think the same exact thing is true for us as Christians, that we certainly have doctrine that we need to be paying attention to and be very careful theologians, especially when we get into issues of Christology or the doctrine of the Trinity. But much of what we talk about Christianity is basic. It's reading God's Word, studying God's Word. It's daily time in prayer. It's having those basic pieces of sanctification in our life. Here we are Renewing Your Mind. And we go back to Romans 12, one and two, and doesn't Paul simplify it when he says, don't be conformed, be transformed.

Now, scripture goes on to fill in a lot of details there, but just keeping those two basics in place. And so over the years of thinking, what are they realistically going to remember? Let's focus on what matters and those central truths that are going to be part of their mental furniture, so to speak, for the rest of their lives.

And I think the same thing is true for kids. We want this for our kids. We want this for Christian kids. We want them to have some sort of basic mental furniture that will just stick with them and be a part of who they are for their life to come. This really is a 40,000-foot overview of the Bible. As you say, mental furniture, helping people understand the structure of scripture. I think for a new Christian, and even for me when I was a new Christian, I was tempted to just begin in Genesis and try and read through the Bible and get to Leviticus or Numbers and just get lost. Why is it so helpful to have that structure in place when it comes to Bible study? So the Bible can be an intimidating book. And as we get into it, we find those sections of it that are a little difficult for us to understand what's going on. And it's sort of like we're trying to put together a puzzle without the box, without the puzzle box to guide us. And so we have all these pieces, and they're fascinating.

Biblical texts are so interesting. We look at the contours of the piece or whatever colors it may have. We go, oh, isn't that interesting? And we look at another piece and another piece. But after a while, we're sort of awash in it.

And so what we need to do is take a step back and say, okay, what's the picture on the box? So the big picture of the Bible is very simple. It starts in Genesis with creation. It ends in Revelation with the restoration of all things, this wonderful promise.

Behold, I am making all things new. And then the new heavens and the new earth. And it just is so uplifting, those final chapters. Well, in between is the fall, which of course comes very quickly in the story, and then redemption. And so that storyline, creation, fall, redemption, restoration is the puzzle box lid.

And so now as I come into these texts, where do they fit in the scheme? And, you know, the older theologians would talk about scripture as being tied together by the scarlet thread of redemption. Well, now we're bumping into the covenant and theologians will speak of the covenant of works and the covenant of grace. And that covenant of grace runs all through scripture.

And we see moments where it's punctuated and developed. You see it right in Genesis chapter 12 to 15 with Abraham. You see it again in 2 Samuel 7 with David. And then you come into the New Testament and you see Paul being a minister of the new covenant, or you see Hebrews 8 talking about Christ as a priest of the new covenant. And so now we understand that creation, fall, redemption as being developed through the storyline of the Bible, as the biblical covenants in the unfolding of this grand, glorious covenant of grace.

And so as we're reading in the texts and we're trying to figure out where these pieces fit, don't forget to look at that picture on the box so you can say, aha, this is where this now fits. And it just helps us have that understanding of scripture. You say in Bible Basics that the Bible is God's story.

It is a story of God creating and redeeming a people for himself and restoring his people to full and glorious fellowship with him. And what I so appreciate about that line is the simple first sentence, the Bible is God's story. And without that understanding, we can be tempted to read the Bible as if it's my story and about me. But the Bible is God-centered, and it's so important for us to have that perspective, a big God theology.

Absolutely. You know, we talk about hermeneutics, which is a fancy term, the art and science of interpreting the Bible. But when we move into hermeneutics and interpretation and application, one of the questions we often forget to ask is, what is this text teaching me about God? And so when we come at this as God's story that I am a part of, so what is the covenant, right? I will be your God, and you will be my people.

What a great story. We play a role here. But this is God's story, and as we understand who God is, that helps us understand who we are and where we fit into his grand scheme. So yes, we cannot be God-centered enough and God-focused enough. So you've talked a little bit about the structure of Scripture and these four movements as we go from Genesis to Revelation. Can you talk a little bit about the genres in the Bible and why that matters when it comes to interpreting texts? Yeah, so the Bible is literature. And the big piece of literature in the Bible, the bulk of the genre, is narrative, history.

And we find history showing up in the prophetic books so that we think, well, that's all prophecy, but you read the prophets and there's history. Of course, in the law, which is a genre into itself, the first five books, the Pentateuch, the bulk of it's narrative. The Gospels and Acts in the New Testament, the bulk is narrative. So as you come to narrative, you basically have three components. You have the plot line, you have the setting, and then you have the characters. And that's true of all narratives.

And so it's a very helpful way to read the biblical narratives along those lines. Where is the plot? The whole creation, fall, redemption, restoration is a plot line. But where is the plot line? Where is the plot line in the Gospels? What is the setting? So we get into Matthew and it's the Sermon on the Mount.

Well, that setting is very important. It's taking us right back to Moses and the giving of the law on Mount Sinai. And now this is Christ, the new Moses, and giving the Sermon on the Mount. And what I love about the narrative in Scripture is the characters. And they're fascinating characters. And they're very human, these characters.

These are real people in real space in real time. So that's narrative. We could get into poetry. And we know in English, rhyme is a big feature of poetry. Terseness, that is being very select and few with our words. Well, terseness carries over to Hebrew poetry. But it's not so much the rhyme of the sound as much as it is the rhyme of ideas. And we call this parallelism. And there's different types of parallelism.

But as you begin to understand poetry, you can see it at work. We move into prophecy, which is where a lot of people get a little tripped up and confused sometimes. And we have to realize that in prophetic literature, there is imagery that is trying to illustrate and teach points.

And so I think there are limits there in terms of how literal we're going to interpret. Is a double-edged sword protruding out of the mouth of Christ? Or is that symbolic to represent his judgment as the creeds tell us he's coming in glory and in judgment? And so prophecy. Then when we get to the New Testament, we get a whole new genre of epistle. And the epistle was the most common literary genre of the first century Greco-Roman world.

And here it is in the New Testament. And epistles have structures. And there's the introduction and there's arguments and there's development of the argument. And so as we read these epistles, we can understand them along the structure of the genre. So when we're talking about interpreting the Bible, Nathan, I think the key is context. And so there's an historical context. There's a grammatical context.

Sentences are within paragraphs or within units or within books. There's a canonical context. But there's also the literary context.

And that's the genre. And so all of these can just help us as we think about them be better students of God's Word. I'd like to go back to narrative because you called out the characters. And there are very interesting characters throughout Scripture. One of the things that you've often brought up at Always Ready when we're asking the question, can I trust the Bible, is the characters of Scripture, especially some of the characters of the New Testament, that this is an evidence that this truly is a unique book, a divinely inspired book.

Right. A classic example, of course, is Thomas. And so here's Thomas. He's been with Christ, this whole public ministry.

He's seen miracle after miracle. And he doubts. And I think he represents a lot of people.

So I think that's interesting that he plays this role. But what we see is Thomas is coming to the resurrected Jesus when he's going to encounter the resurrected Jesus. He's coming as a skeptic.

And he's pretty forceful about his skepticism. And then what happens? Jesus presents himself, and Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15, 6, that he presents himself to over 500 people. So this was not an off-hidden miracle somewhere. It was right out there for the public to see. And what do we see? Thomas.

He just melts. And he makes the confession, my Lord and my God. And so, yeah, these characters, especially the ones that are confronting Jesus, can be very helpful for us and very revealing. You have chapters in Bible Basics on scripture memorization as well as prayer. And I really appreciate, especially in the chapter on Bible memorization, you even suggest verses and texts that are a helpful starting place when it comes to memorizing the Bible.

I was even with my son this morning, and he was reciting some of the verses from Romans as he's following your lead there to memorize the gospel and to help him to be able to communicate that with others. But why are Bible memorization and prayer important disciplines that you are focused on in this book? Well, I'll go back to my King James days when I first memorized scripture.

Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee. I think Bible memorization is important. Go back to what we said earlier about the mental furniture of just having in your mind these texts and key texts, anchor texts that just help us think.

Here we go again with Renewing Your Mind. Paul is so clear that much of the Christian life begins in the mind. And then, of course, with Paul, it's worked out to the heart and then worked out into service as we obey. But having scripture, you know, all of us, Nathan, have a worldview. We all have mental frames, and we're going to live by that. That worldview is going to manifest itself in our behaviors and our actions and the choices we make. So what we need to do is not be conformed to the world's worldview. We've got to get past that. And we've got to adopt a new way of thinking and a new perspective, new perspective on relationships, a new perspective on values and what matters and a new perspective on eternity. And so all of that will be as we saturate ourselves with God's word. And, you know, I think we have a tremendous capacity for memory. I think of all the song lyrics I have tucked away up there in my head somewhere or movie lines. We have a tremendous capacity for memory.

Why don't we memorize what is sweeter than the honeycomb? What is the most precious gift? God's word. And then, you know, to also say this, especially with kids, start out small. Start out with just small phrases, small verses, and let them build and progress. And then just to mention quickly prayer, of course, you know, we have the Lord's Prayer, but the other thing we have in scripture are examples of prayer. And probably something that reveals our theology the most is our prayers. And I think what we need to help ourselves is to pray better and pray well. And so as we get into scripture and as we see biblical authors and biblical figures praying, we can see templates.

And now we can apply that and bring our particular situation to bear. But again, it's sort of giving us some structure, maybe even some guardrails for prayer. So, yeah, so we included a chapter on Bible memorization and a chapter on prayer. There may be mothers, fathers listening that are thinking to themselves, I don't feel equipped enough to be able to help my children in understanding the Bible or even in praying better. I don't have a degree in theology. What advice, what counsel do you give to a mom or a dad that is wanting to help their children be raised in these truths, but they just don't feel equipped? Yeah, you know, we mentioned it earlier, the Bible can be intimidating. Christianity can be intimidating.

And the last thing a parent wants to do is teach their kid something that's wrong and not going to be helpful for them. God has given the church teachers and he's given the church teachers through the millennia. So we have creeds and confessions. We have books. We have faithful teachers like R.C.

Sproul. We have faithful teachers who've written children's books. And so these teachers are a gift to help people.

So you're not alone. You don't have to figure this out on your own. Use some of these faithful, trusted resources that God has given to the church through his gifted teachers.

But the other thing I would say is just start small and move from there. Go back to Luther with his Hans and his Lena. It's the Ten Commandments. It's the Lord's Prayer. It's the Apostles' Creed. These are some basics that we can work through and can be very helpful. You think about the phrases in the Lord's Prayer. Well, each one of those is a gateway into thinking about God and his relationship to us. The Apostles' Creed, each one of those phrases is a gateway into more theology behind it. So just coming in, we've said this word a lot in this interview, Nathan, just coming into the basics and just hammering those basics. And it's sort of like making sure the foundation is solid.

And now let's keep building the house. Of course, I would say this book, Bible Basics, is helpful for one of those moms and dads. But it's why Ligonier Ministries has the Reformation Study Bible and why we're taking it into the world's most spoken languages, or month in and month out, Table Talk magazine. As you said, there are books, there are resources out there to help those moms and dads walk their children and themselves through the truths of Scripture. Now, we keep calling this book Bible Basics because that's its name.

But I wouldn't want anyone to think that it is simplistic. You do dedicate time on doctrine, talking about justification, a Reformed understanding of faith, even having assurance, which is a question that comes up often, even at Always Ready. Why is doctrine vital, even for a new Christian? Yes, so doctrine really is, at its best, a summation of the biblical teaching. So take Christology, for example, or the doctrine of Christ.

How much material is there in the Bible on the doctrine of Christ? And so what doctrine does is come along and look at all that material and try to bring it into some sort of summary. It's sort of like Paul, when he was with the Ephesian elders, and he said, I labor to teach you the whole counsel of God.

So this is where heresies come from. If we only are reading certain portions of Scripture, focusing on certain portions of Christ, we may reach the conclusion that he's only human, and what a great human he was. But that is not reflective of the whole Bible's teaching on who Christ is. So doctrine is not something that is different than or outside of Scripture. Doctrine, at its best, brings all of Scripture to a summary and to a whole.

And when we're talking about who God is, God is a Trinity, who Christ is, who we are as human beings, if all we focus in on is the image of God and not see ourselves as fallen, we're going to have a very warped view of what it means to be a human being. So doctrine helps us do that. And again, in the book, I want to come alongside, maybe demystify some of the doctrine.

People here are theologians, and they're using Latin, and they're using very long words, and they feel like, oh, I can't do this. But again, we go back to some of these basics, and we realize that we do need an understanding of this. And what's more, we need to teach doctrine, and the younger we can teach it, the better. And so, yeah, focused on some doctrines in here, as you mentioned, justification by faith alone. Also, going back to Christ, Calvin introduced this wonderful way of thinking about Jesus as a prophet, priest, and king. And so it helps us summarize Jesus' work, both in his incarnate ministry, but even now, in his present session, advocating on our behalf. So those are some of the things that I think can be very helpful as we try to, again, understand what the whole counsel of God is and be equipped as a Christian. Well, we've addressed the word basics, that although it is the basics, it's not simplistic.

It's simple, but not simplistic. Now, I want to look at the word Bible. This is Bible basics, but you did choose to include creeds and confessions in here.

Why did you make that decision? Well, again, what we're talking about with the best of creeds, the best of confessions, they're not creating extra biblical material. They're bringing scripture together. And so we as Christians have a lot of riches from our past.

And I want to introduce, especially this next generation, but even just new Christians to that past. And so a little taste, some creeds, some portions of some of the Reformation catechisms. I mean, Heidelberg catechism, question one and two, and the answers are beautiful literature. Just, you can ponder over those paragraphs.

They're just beautiful. Even the solace, Nathan, that's a theological construct that comes to us from the Reformation and how helpful it is to really get at the center of what historic Christian orthodoxy is. So sometimes at Ligonier, we talk about breadcrumbs. We sort of leave breadcrumbs for people to go find all these riches in church history.

And so that is definitely a breadcrumb chapter. Well, I heartily recommend Bible basics. I've given a copy to each of my children. As I mentioned earlier, my youngest son, he is enthusiastically reading this right now. But as we come to a close, Dr. Nichols, any encouragement for our listeners today?

Yes. I don't think we've mentioned this yet, Nathan. I would mention hymns. I think hymns are so crucial because, of course, the best of hymns bring together solid biblical reflection, theological reflection, but it's in the context of devotion, and it just brings it together. And so I do introduce some hymns here and even get kids to be thinking, what are some of your favorite hymns?

So I'd mention that. And then also just to remember, and maybe this is the most basic thing of all, and when we think about hymns, you know, we're singing and that's worship, but worship is far more than that. Worship is the calling of our lives. And when we are obedient, we're worshiping. When we're studying, we're worshiping.

When we're cultivating the gifts and talents God has given us, we are worshiping. And so to keep that very basic, it's where we see ourselves going out the door when we read the book of Revelation and where the Bible ends itself. It ends itself in this wonderful worship course that's taking place in heaven that we get to be a part of. But I would just end with that.

You know, R.C. used to say, all theology is doxology. All theology ends in worship.

And again, perhaps that's the most basic of the Christian life. It reminds me of a line that you wrote, doctrine is not just about knowledge, it leads us to love and worship God rightly. Well, Dr. Nichols, thank you so much for Bible Basics and for being in the studio with us today. My pleasure.

Thank you. That was Stephen Nichols on this Friday edition of Renewing Your Mind discussing his book Bible Basics and the importance of having that mental furniture to a Bible reading and Bible study. Now being three months into the year, perhaps your original plans for studying the Bible have just slipped a little bit. So I hope today's conversation has encouraged you with your Bible reading. If you're interested in reading Bible Basics or you know someone that you'd like to get a copy to, please call us at 800-435-4343 or visit renewingyourmind.org. When you give a donation of any amount, we'll get this hardcover book to you.

But be quick as this is a one-day offer and it's only while supplies last. From the big picture of the Bible, the Bible's covenants and a history of significant biblical events to Bible memorization, doctrine and hymnody, there is a lot contained in this easy-to-read and introductory overview of Scripture and the Christian life. Introduce someone to the basics of the Bible or return to them yourself when you give a donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org or by using the link in the podcast show notes. Thank you for supporting Renewing Your Mind, a listener-supported outreach of Ligonier Ministries. Suffering is not the exception but is often the norm for the Christian as we navigate life in a fallen world. So how should we respond to suffering and why shouldn't we be surprised when we face it?

Join us Monday here on Renewing Your Mind. New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989, 1995 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.