Gospel.com Blog

Not every Christian tradition celebrates Lent, but many do. While my denomination doesn’t require its members to participate in Lent, it does encourage us to use the time to “invest in practices that heighten our awareness of God.” In keeping with that, I’ve decided to set aside an hour of every day during Lent for private devotions. I’ve done this off and on before, but never consistently or for an extended season. After all, who has an hour every single day to spend doing “nothing”?

Some of you are thinking to yourselves: “One hour? I don’t have time for that!” Me neither—it’s going to be difficult for me to make the time, but that’s the point. And my hat is off to those of you who are thinking, “One hour? That seems so short!”

What about you? Are you fasting from anything, or doing anything special for Lent this year?

Our friends at BibleGateway.com have just added a new Bible translation to their library of online Bibles: the Common English Bible (New Testament)!

The Common English Bible isn’t simply a revision or update of an existing translation. It’s an ambitious new translation designed to read smoothly and naturally without compromising the accuracy of the Bible text. As the CEB translators did their work, a team of reading specialists from more than a dozen Christian denominations reviewed the text to ensure that the CEB is accessible to all English readers, including children, Bible students, and people encountering the Bible for the first time. The CEB represents the work of a diverse team with broad scholarship, drawing from over 100 scholars—men and women from twenty-two faith traditions in American, African, Asian, European and Latino communities.

The result is a strong, readable translation that will be a welcome addition to your Bible study. It’s available now in the Bible version drop-down menu at BibleGateway.com. You can read more about the CEB, or start reading!

What makes a Bible translation accurate? Is accuracy defined by exact faithfulness to the wording of the original text? Or is accuracy a matter of capturing the meaning behind the original words?

That’s the opening discussion question at the brand-new Perspectives in Translation forum, which just launched at our sister site BibleGateway.com. The forum, hosted by Collin Hansen of The Gospel Coalition, is dedicated to scholarly dialogue about the tough questions of English Bible translation. A team of respected Bible and translation scholars will be debating every aspect of Bible translation.

You’ll find the dialogue there insightful and thought-provoking—and we hope you’ll not only read it, but particpate in the discussion yourself. Stop by Perspectives in Translation to watch the discussion unfold and to share your own questions and observations!

Looking for some everyday inspiration? Our friends at Bible Gateway have just launched several new free email newsletters to deliver insightful and encouraging content straight to your inbox.

If spiritual insight is what you’re interested in, you can sign up to receive the Verse of the Day or a daily devotional by Charles Spurgeon. For a taste of Bible history, the “Men of the Bible” and “Women of the Bible” newsletters explore the lives of famous Bible characters, drawing from them lessons for our lives today. You can also sign up to receive news and announcements from Bible Gateway.

Stop by and take a look at the newsletters, and sign up for all that interest you. Bible Gateway plans to add additional newsletters on a regular basis, so check back periodically to see what’s new. Enjoy!

In a handful of places throughout the Bible, an individual is singled out by the text and described as a particularly respected or upright person: Job was the “greatest of all the men of the east;” Joseph found “success in everything he did,” and Daniel “possessed an extraordinary spirit.” What did these men do to merit these glowing descriptions… and what can we do do emulate them?

According to Charles Swindoll in this Day by Day devotional, what set these “great men” of the Bible apart was not luck, good fortune, cleverness, or inborn talent, but something much simpler:

What did these men have in common? Perfection? These men were far from perfect. Easy times? Hardly. How about slick rhetoric? Wrong again. What they had in common was character—high moral character. They walked securely; they didn’t fear being “found out.” [....]

We have every right to expect of ourselves and others virtue, dignity, self-mastery, resoluteness, determination, strength of will, moral purity, and personal integrity—in public and in private. The fact that many fail to live up to the minimal daily requirement does not change the ideal.

If men like Job and Joseph and Daniel could demonstrate character in the worst of times, you and I can do so now. And because we can, we must.

Do you consider yourself to be a person of character… and would the people you interact with each day describe you that way? What can you do to develop the type of character that set the heroes of the Bible apart from their contemporaries?

There are many different approaches to studying the Bible. Some people follow rigid reading plans; others skip around. Some people find methodologies like inductive and topical Bible studies helpful.

In the past, I’ve used books that steadily and purposefully walked me through a passage; but when left to my own devices I tend to slowly read through one book at a time. I might not move on from a particular chapter for a few days or even weeks.

What about you? How do you do your personal Bible Study?

Share your thoughts!

A few weeks ago we asked the following question on the Bible Gateway Facebook fan page: apart from your Bible, what do you have with you when you read or study Scripture? It turned out to be a much more interesting question than I thought it would be.

Some people wrote that they had nothing but the Bible with them, while others listed a cavalcade of writing implements and reference materials. Also, coffee appeared in quite a few responses.

I like the question because it gives us a glimpse into how other people approach a task that’s near and dear to many of our hearts. I generally have just the Bible and perhaps my journal with me when I study Scripture. However, after reading what other things people bring with them, I’m interested to see what might change if I tried out highlighters or a few reference books as well.

What about you? Apart from the Bible, what do you bring into your personal Bible study? Have you found anything particularly effective?

For such short and simple stories, Jesus’ parables can be surprisingly difficult to understand. Take the famous parable of the mustard seed. Is the kingdom of heaven the seed? Or the tree that grows from the seed? Does this parable have a different meaning when viewed through the lens of ancient Jewish society and culture?

These questions have long fascinated Sunday school teachers and theologians alike, and in this devotional at Slice of Infinity, Jill Carattini explores the compelling but elusive significance of Jesus’ parables:

Though the theological and methodological approaches to [the parable of the mustard seed] may be varied, perhaps in varying degrees each contends a similar truth: The kingdom of God holds much to be discovered, discussed, and held in wonder. [...]

In each of these approaches to Jesus’s unlikely comparison, we find truths and wonders worth gleaning as if from a great and fruitful tree. The parable of the mustard seed depicts the inconspicuous ministry of Jesus and the sometimes hidden signs of his significance as holding a potential far beyond metaphor or imagination, culture or history. The kingdom of God is not in the future only, nor is it only at hand in a history we cannot reach; it is here even now, reaching out with branches that bid all to come and dwell. As with all of Jesus’s stories, which “leap out of their historical situation and confront us as if they had not yet spoken their final word,” this parable of the kingdom will continue to surprise us if we will continue to inquire.

Jesus’ parables challenge us to actively participate—they are simple stories with clear messages, but they nevertheless almost require the reader to respond to them with thoughtful questions about their meaning.

Is there a particular parable that you find most intriguing? What questions did it prompt you to ask, and what did you learn from it as a result?

For such a widely-read book, the Bible can be a challenge to read and understand. To be sure, it takes no special training to appreciate the Bible and grasp its Gospel message… but there is a reason that even the most enthusiastic Bible reading plan often hits a wall just a few books into the Old Testament. Many sections of the Bible use vocabulary words and writing styles that aren’t familiar to modern readers.

Fortunately, there’s a lot of Bible-reading help at hand. In his Day by Day devotional, Chuck Swindoll lists out some readily-available resources that will help you get the most out of your Bible reading. Here’s just a few from his list:

Listen, you don’t have to be a theological brain to dig into God’s riches… but you do need some mining equipment. These tools are basic to intelligent, meaningful Bible study. They will enable you to find most of the answers you need, and they are as easy to use as your TV guide. There are at least four you should have on hand.

A Bible concordance. It contains an alphabetical index of all the terms found in the Bible, and it comes in handy when you want to put your finger on a particular verse but can only remember a few words in it. It’s also invaluable if you want a complete list of all the verses using the same word. [...]

A Bible dictionary. It is more than a list of words and definitions. It’s like a one-volume encyclopedia, containing vital information on people, places, doctrines, customs, and cultural matters. I recommend either Unger’s Bible Dictionary (well illustrated, scholarly but readable) or the New Bible Dictionary (contains longer articles on technical subjects).

Read the rest of the devotional for his complete list. He helpfully lists out specific titles for each category to help you get started.

Do you keep any of these resources on hand while you read the Bible? What others would you recommend?

If you’re an evangelical churchgoer, chances are you’re familiar with the Sunday morning “mini-Greek-lesson”—the part of a sermon where the preacher refers back to a Bible passage’s original language in order to better explain its meaning.

Reading a Bible passage in its original language doesn’t unlock any hidden secrets that are missing from modern English translations, but it can be helpful in interpreting challenging passages. For this reason, I’ve long felt that even a basic, introductory knowledge of Greek or Hebrew (just enough to look something up in a Greek or Hebrew dictionary and understand the information there) is a very worthwhile goal for Christians to pursue, given the chance.

Have you ever read part of the Bible in the original language in which it was written? How did it affect your Bible study in general? If you don’t currently know Greek or Hebrew, do you plan to study one or both of them in the future?

Share your thoughts!