I.  The Word: Psalm 119:97-104

⁹⁷ O how I love Your law!

It is my meditation all the day.

⁹⁸ Your commandments make me wiser than my enemies,

For they are ever mine.

⁹⁹ I have more insight than all my teachers,

For Your testimonies are my meditation.

¹⁰⁰ I understand more than the aged,

Because I have observed Your precepts.

¹⁰¹ I have restrained my feet from every evil way,

That I may keep Your word.

¹⁰² I have not turned aside from Your ordinances,

For You Yourself have taught me.

¹⁰³ How sweet are Your words to my taste!

Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth!

¹⁰⁴ From Your precepts I get understanding;

Therefore I hate every false way

II.  Reflection Questions:

1. Do you study the Bible daily?
2. Do you know how to study the Bible?
3. Do you know how to get the most out of your Bible study time?

Ok. So, I know this is supposed to be a devotional on God’s Word and spiritual hunger, and I am supposed to write something deep that carries you on the wings of angels into the throne room of the Almighty. But when it comes to spiritual matters I have often been accused of being practical, and not wanting to disappoint, instead of writing something to encourage your spiritual hunger, I thought it eminently more practical to help satisfy it by sharing some of my experience on how to get more out of studying the Bible.

One thing being a trial lawyer has taught me is how to ask questions, lots of questions. This skill is particularly helpful when it comes to studying the Bible. The good news is you don’t have to have a law degree to use this skill. Here’s how you can apply it to get more out of your Bible study time.

It is fairly simple; when I read a passage in the Bible I ask six questions, Who? What? When? Why? Where? How? Take, for example, Acts 17:19 which recounts part of Paul’s visit to Athens: “And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, ‘May we know what his new teaching is which you are proclaiming.’”

I would ask: Who took him (Paul)? Why did they take him to the Areopagus? What is the Areopagus? Where is the Areopagus? When did this take place? How long did it take to get to the Areopagus? What did Paul do when he got there? These are some of the questions I would ask. Answering questions like these make the story come to life by eliciting context and details from which you can derive meaning and instruction. Sometimes answers to the questions are found in the surrounding scriptures. Sometimes you must resort to the Internet or Bible study aids. But asking questions is where it starts.

I was in Athens, Greece, a few years ago. While there I studied Acts 17 just before heading out to visit the Areopagus. In Acts 17, Paul is debating in the market place in Athens with the Stoic philosophers (“What is Stoicism?”) before they lead Paul to the Areopagus. One of the questions I asked as I read Acts 17 that morning was “How long did it take Paul to get from the market place to the Areopagus?” If I had done some research I probably could have found out, but I was going there anyway.

So, after I got there I walked from the ruins of the market place to the Areopagus. It’s a good walk up a steep incline toward the Acropolis, a Greek pagan temple (“What is the Acropolis?”), near where the Areopagus is located, and it took about 15 minutes. This surprised me because I always assumed these men just took Paul across the street.

In answering this question, though, I realized Paul had time to think about what to say and contemplate the real danger of preaching to the Athenian Supreme Court (“What is the Areopagus?”) about Jesus with the most famous pagan temple in Greece just a stone’s throw away. Yet Paul didn’t back down. He was one tough dude. He was bold in sharing the gospel, and it is one of the reasons he is one of my heroes.

There are other ways to study the Bible. You can read it chronologically, topically, book-by-book, or according to prepared plans that combine a balanced diet of Old Testament and New Testament scripture into daily readings. But my default and tried and tested method is to interrogate the text of the Bible.

So, next time you study the Bible, just go Denny Crane or Saul Goodman on the text.  You might be surprised at what you discover.