Memorizing Scripture

Two posts recently from DesiringGod:

Memorizing Scripture: Why and How

Memorizing Scripture for Praying Scripture

I have found the approach that Piper links to very effective.

Beginner Bible study resources

I just emailed the following to a young friend of mine, who is developing quite a hunger for God's Word. What would you add to the list?

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Here is a list of solid resources to get you started. The list is not meant to intimidate you; these are resources you can work at accumulating. Books that I think you should purchase and use without a moment's delay are marked by a double-asterisk. I've marked 2nd priority resources with one asterisk. The rest are books you can work at over the years to come (Lord willing).

Please know that just because I recommend these resources, that doesn't mean that I think everything in them is right. Use discernment with everything you read.

Bibles (use a few translations)

• English Standard Version
  
• KJV
• New International Version
  
• New American Standard Bible
• New English Translation - available online, with very useful notes
  
• New Living Translation

Study Bible

• ESV Study Bible **
  

Books on reading / studying Bible

• Knowing Scripture by R.C. Sproul **
  
• How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth by Gordon Fee **
  
• How to Read the Bible Book By Book by Gordon Fee **
  
• 40 Questions about Interpreting the Bible by Robert Plummer

Bible Atlas

• ESV Bible Atlas

Bible Software

• Free: The Word **
  
• Expensive, but awesome: Logos

Bible Dictionary

• New Bible Dictionary by Intervarsity **
  

Greek (and Hebrew)

• Mounce's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old & New Testament Words, by William Mounce (I recommend this over Vine's dictionary, which is too out-of-date)
  
• New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology by Verbrugge
• Greek for the Rest of Us by William Mounce
• Hebrew for the Rest of Us by Fields
  

Theology

• Evangelical Dictionary of Theology by Elwell *
  
• Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudem
  

Surveys

• Introducing the New Testament by Carson, Moo, and Naselli *
  
• Encountering the Old Testament: A Christian Survey by Arnold

One-volume commentary

• New Bible Commentary by Intervarsity **
  

Commentaries on individual books of the Bible

• go to Denver Seminary's NT bibliography and choose from the last three commentaries they list for each book of the Bible (the other commentaries they list will be too technical)
• The NIV Application, Tyndale, Bible Speaks Today, and IVP commentary series are for the most part excellent. Unfortunately, the What the Bible Teaches series rarely provides what a commentary should provide, but there are some exceptions.
  
• for the BEST commentary series of all, go here.
  

Great Books you should read

• For the Love of God, volume 1 and volume 2, by Carson. An excellent devotional.
• The Pursuit of God by Tozer
• Knowing God by Packer
• Desiring God by Piper
• What Jesus Demands from the World by Piper
• Mere Christianity by C.S Lewis
• any and all books by David Gooding

Great Preachers to listen to

You will learn a ton by always having some good expositional sermons on your ipod.

• John Piper
• D.A. Carson
• Tim Keller (and here)
  
• Sinclair Ferguson
• you can all get mp3's of Jack Hunter and Albert Leckie
  

Calvin on interpreting the Bible

Recently I reviewed Bruce Gordon's biography of John Calvin. This post is part four of a short series of snippets from the book.

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Calvin used all the means available to him to interpret the Bible, including the methods he learned as a humanist. And yet he encountered the living, Triune God in the scriptures. He placed great emphasis on seeing how the church fathers had interpreted the Bible, and his knowledge of their writings was incredible. “He saw himself engaged in a sustained conversation with ancient and contemporary interpreters, none of whom was infallible. It was a conversation in the service of the Church, guided by the Spirit and grounded in the Word of God” (p.108).

“Calvin, like the other reformers, understood that scripture could not stand without a framework of interpretation” (p.108).

References:

Bruce Gordon, Calvin (New Haven [Conn.] and London: Yale University Press, 2009).

Calvin on the distinction between the Bible and the Word of God

Recently I reviewed Bruce Gordon's biography of John Calvin. This post is part three of a short series of snippets from the book.

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“All the reformers distinguished between the Bible and the Word of God, or Gospel. Scripture contains ‘perfect doctrine,’ which is God’s revelation, but it is not itself the Gospel” (p.104).

References:

Bruce Gordon, Calvin (New Haven [Conn.] and London: Yale University Press, 2009).

Calvin on Bible Translation

Recently I reviewed Bruce Gordon's biography of John Calvin. This post is part of a short series of snippets from the book.

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“Citing the example of the church fathers Augustine, Jerome and Chrysotom, Calvin held that there was a long and honourable tradition of making scripture available to the ‘simple people’ (p.55).

1. Bruce Gordon, Calvin (New Haven [Conn.] and London: Yale University Press, 2009).
   

The power of repetitive Bible reading

A month of listening to his parents read Luke 2 enables little Orison Piper to be able to do this.

Also, Justin Taylor posts some excellent Bible reading plans. I'm going to follow Robert Murray M'Cheyne's this year, using one of Don Carson's books as an aid.

OK, so I've talked about Bible reading and Bible memorizing. That leaves biblical praying. John Piper has provided a very helpful list in answer to the question: what should we pray for? It's worth printing out and praying through.

Every Christian a Bible scholar; every scholar a Bible-lover

Dave Black puts in a plug for Erasmus, which, as it turns out, is also a plug for reading the Bible (especially in Greek and Hebrew). Here's Erasmus:

“I am now eager, dear Colet, to approach sacred literature full sail, full gallop; I have an extreme distaste for anything that distracts me from it, or even delays me…. Hereafter I intend to address myself to the Scriptures and to spend the rest of my life upon them.”

BTW, I recently listened to a message by Mark Driscoll that really encouraged me in the same way. That is, to read the Bible for myself, to read it lots, and to read it to find Jesus. He disclosed the six practical questions he asks of a text. I'm already working on adopting them for myself:

1. What does the Bible say in this passage?
2. What does this passage mean?
3. What is the hook in the passage?
4. Where is the resistance to this passage? (the apologetical question)
   
5. What is the significance of this passage (to me, to my family, to my church, to my city)?
6. Where is Jesus in this passage?