Serious discussion about how scripture ought to be handled.

Let me begin by briefly outlining how I believe we ought to approach interpretation of the Bible.

1) The Bible was not written in chapters and verses. They are not in the original they were added way later by someone and often serve only to make passages harder to read. Have you seen any other book divided up in such a pitiful way? I have not. A couple of examples.

Then the LORD appeared to Solomon by night, and said to him: "I have heard your prayer, and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice. When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to prayer made in this place. For now I have chosen and sanctified this house, that My name may be there forever; and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually. As for you, if you walk before Me as your father David walked, and do according to all that I have commanded you, and if you keep My statutes and My judgments, then I will establish the throne of your kingdom, as I covenanted with David your father, saying, 'You shall not fail to have a man as ruler in Israel.' "But if you turn away and forsake My statutes and My commandments which I have set before you, and go and serve other gods, and worship them, then I will uproot them from My land which I have given them; and this house which I have sanctified for My name I will cast out of My sight, and will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples. "And as for this house, which is exalted, everyone who passes by it will be astonished and say, 'Why has the LORD done thus to this land and this house?' Then they will answer, 'Because they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and embraced other gods, and worshiped them and served them; therefore He has brought all this calamity on them.'"

One partial sentence of this appearance of God to Solomon is used ad nauseum in this forum and around the USA to state that God will save our land if "christians" will repent. It's speaking about Israel. God didn't appear to Nero, Herod, Caesar, Alexander, Abraham Lincoln, Bill Clinton, George Bush, Obama or Romney and repeat these promises. Christians are told to look for a city who's Architect and Builder is God.

Until I was 17 I never heard a word about the end of this sentence. "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:"

He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

When we write something and someone takes a phrase out and makes it mean the exact opposite we are upset. I'm sure God is.

I was blessed to attend a Christian school going up and 1 Bible teacher suggested that we read a short book like Ephesians once a day for a month and we would almost have it memorized and it would change our lives. He was right. Thanks, Herb!

2) We ought to stick to a grammatical, historical approach of all of the Scriptures. Who was it first written to, by whom and why. And then we can better understand how it relates to us in the here and now.

Here's another text I have heard taught wrong a ton of times.

"I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth."

False interpretation: Jesus wants you to be all for Him or all against Him, not somewhere in the middle. Why would Jesus want us to be all against Him instead of in the middle sometimes? Paul was certainly in the middle sometimes as are all of us if we're honest. We are still in the flesh. He, like us was awaiting the resurrection or the rapture to be totally free.

I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God-through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

If you know the geography and history of Ephesus you can interpret the passage correctly. There were mineral springs in Ephesus and lukewarm mineral water is used to induce vomiting. Hot and cold mineral water have other uses.

For my own study and reading I have made a Word document with no chapter and verse markings only sentences and paragraphs to be able to read the text more easily. It is the NKJV version.