"Apply yourself wholly to the text; Apply the text wholly to yourself"

     I heard this quote last week during the Daily Dose of Greek, Saturday edition and it grabbed my attention. The quote immediately resonated with me. It said in a succinct manner how we should approach the Scriptures. The person sharing this quote was Dr. Doug Moo, retired New Testament professor from Wheaton College. This profound statement is not original with Dr. Moo. It comes from the 18^th century scholar Johann Albrecht Bengel and Dr. Moo took it as a guiding principle in his vocation as a New Testament scholar.

     The reason this statement from Bengel resonated with me is that it describes how we should approach the Word of God. First of all, we have to understand what God is saying and then we consider how to apply it to our lives. There are many followers of Christ who approach the Bible as a student. Their primary goal is to understand what the passage is saying. Then they stop, being intellectually satisfied. They have fulfilled the first half of the quote but have ignored the rest of the saying.

     On the other side of the coin, there are other followers of Christ who take a text of Scripture and apply it to their lives without carefully understanding what the passage says. Many times, when I have taught a class on interpreting the Bible, I would ask the student, “What does the passage say?”, when they tried to apply it before interpreting the passage. What usually happens is they misinterpret the text because they are overlaying their own   application onto the passage.

     How should we approach our own study of the Scriptures? First, understand the passage and then apply it to our lives. God’s desire is for us to be transformed, as children of God. He desires for us to become more and more Christlike. In order for this to happen, we have to understand what God has said to us in His Word.

     One underlying element to Bengel’s quote is the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. He is the one who enlightens our minds and hearts to understand the Scriptures and then apply it. It goes without saying there will be times when we will need the help of other learned Christians to help us understand more difficult passages. Still, it is ultimately the work of God’s Spirit.

     Speaking personally, I find the first half of Bengel’s quote the easier of the two halves to apply. I have a fair amount of background in studying the Scriptures and I have plenty of tools at my disposal to help me interpret a passage. The bigger challenge for me is applying the Scriptures because it is the time when you are personally interacting with the Holy Spirit. You are examining your life, letting the Holy Spirit convict you and then committing yourself to applying what you have learned. I will continue to grow in this area the rest of my life, but I am thankful for the Scriptures and the Holy Spirit to guide me.