How to Read the Bible

The Bible is a book full of symbolic and idiomatic language, and learning what these idioms mean is an important step to understanding the meaning of the words used.  The book is also something that God expects us to read every day and even study it in depth to mine the knowledge of God out of it.  This is not a book you read once through and then put it on a shelf to collect dust.  If you don't make the Word as important as eating and breathing, then your heart posture toward God is putting him second, third or something other than first as the first Commandment says.  In Matthew 6:11, Christ gave us a prayer and uses the phrase "Give us this day our daily bread".  Bread is an idiom for scripture food or as manna and words spoken by God's voice!   This is even used in the context of the Last Supper in Matthew 26 or the bread and fishes to the 4000 and 5000 people In Matthew 14, Mark 6, Luke 9, John 6 or Matthew 15 and Mark 8.   In John 6 Yeshua explains how he is the bread from Heaven, he is the true manna, because his Words are our daily food and He is the Word made flesh (John 1:14).  We are to eat God's daily bread that is "unleavened", which is scripture and doctrine that is not puffed up and sweetened and polluted by ideas and traditions of men, full of pagan ideas.  

Ezekiel 24:17:  "Forbear to cry, make no mourning for the dead, bind the tire of thine head upon thee, and put on thy shoes upon thy feet (walk as I walk and fish for men), and cover not thy lips (fulfill the Royal Law), and eat not the bread of men (teach pure doctrine)." 

Make note that most of the churches, all 40,000 variations of them, have doctrines heavily polluted by leaven (bread of men) and their doctrines contradict what the Bible actually says.  

In Acts 17:11, it explains how the scholars in Berea were more noble than those in Thessalonica because "they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so."  The true believers are not only the ones who are in their book daily, but they also don't read only the surface of the words on the page, they look at the meaning of words and use resources to help explain the depths of meaning for what is being spoken, and they also understand that often different parts of the scripture inform other parts, where everything cross connects to each other parts at different points for a full picture of what God is saying.  However, even with greatest efforts of scholarship, much of scripture can only be taught through God's Holy Spirit of Truth.  Those who don't obey God His way, who don't have the Holy Spirit of Truth often are the ones either running off to the left side of Truth into disobedience or to the right side of truth to the letter of the book, or they reject the Word in its entirety and throw it out the window.  To stay on the strait and narrow, you have to obey God's 10 Commandments. 

John 14:15-21:  

>>If ye love me, keep my commandments.<< "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;  Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.  I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.  Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.  At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.  He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."   It goes on to say in verse 26 ..."But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, >>he shall teach you all things,<< and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you."

So, even if you find men who have the best degrees and the best reputation for knowledge, and the largest churches, or the nicest people, and the fanciest charts and graphs and who wear the trendiest suits with cufflinks (or even all the kippahs, tzitzits, prayer shawls and related such costumes of religion) God can enlighten even the lowliest of people (publicans and harlots) to overthrow the wisdom of the world, even the mightiest kings overthrown by shepherds, all by the grace of God through the Holy Spirit.    

1 Corinthians 1:25  

"Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.  For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:  But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;  And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught things that are:  That no flesh should glory in his presence.  But of him are ye in Christ Yeshua, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:  That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." 

Mat 13:10-17  "And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables?  He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them (those who are not of Christ) it is not given.  For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath.  Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.  And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias (Isaiah 6:10), "which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive:  For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.  But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.  For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them."

Christ here is telling you that only those diligent in the Word, who are obedient unto God and have the Holy Spirit of Truth, will hear and understand.  This multithread tapestry of layered information is how the Bible is written, because God knew the Devil would inspire men who hate God will try to pollute the Word and mess it up; so crumbs are scattered throughout the book.  The lying scribes at different times figured out how to change the name of God and his Son, they figured out how to hide some precepts, even removing hundreds of verses in modern translations; but, God's truth is still so interlaced throughout  all the books that it is nearly impossible to fully destroy it all without simply burning the whole book.  The true servants will be those who learn to seek out all the threads by the full instruction of God, who will learn to recognize the best translations less affected by the "lying pen of the scribes,"  and are those who Christ praying for to overcome temptations of the world in John 17--It is the same people who are "Blessed" spoken of in the Beatitudes in Matthew 5 and who are spoken of in Revelation 1:3, and have a place near the throne.

Proverbs 25:2  "It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter." 

If you want to be part of the Blessed to get the "corn and wine", which are the bits of truth that the Holy Spirit reveals, you might want to find out who these "Blessed" are and join up with them.  OR, you start obeying the Commandments so you can be one of those people.  It's the difference between what the Bible calls Jacob the Servant--very Elect compared to Israel the Elect from the rest of the world who are deceived and labeled "pots fitted for destruction."   

The language of the Bible has many examples of Idioms, and its purpose is like that of the parables, It is (in part) to hide the full instruction, except for those with ears to hear.  There are literally hundreds of examples, but a few common ones that people need to know: 

• Bread (God's Word)
• Sheep (Israel)
• Watch (Warning / Rebuking)
• Salt (Plain Unfiltered Speech)
• Fields (People's Heart and Conscience)
• Seeds (In some contexts it is a genealogy, but in other context it is truth planted in other people's Fields, which leads to Faith)
• Meek (Those who are humble and contrite before God and who grow in wisdom)
• Grace (Divine influence upon the heart-the conviction to obey God)
• Fruit (Knowledge & Faith that increases in others - people brought to Covenant)
• Olive Tree (Unified Israel)  Two Olive Trees (Northern and Southern Kingdoms)
• Drunkeness (Pride)
• Milk (Basic Instructions of the Faith)
• Meat (Deeper Instructions and Prophecies)

For a longer list of words look here. 

It is our opinion that the best translation for the Bible that conveys its full truth with minimal interference is the King James Bible.  It is the best version that preserved the idioms that allows you to track meaning in prophecies, but also works with reference material like Strong's Concordance, which helps you to understand the meaning of certain words in Greek or Hebrew.  There are no perfect translations, but many of the older (pre 14th century AD) translations interfere and corrupt the text less than the modern versions.  While some say the modern translations are "easier to understand", many of them utterly butcher the truth right out of the book, even deleting dozens of verses and thousands of words and even rewrite the Inspired Word to be gender neutral and cater to other political interests.  

For additional information see here.

Books that are outside the scope of the Bible Canon should never be treated as taboo; many are instructive and helpful.  The Bible even warns you that "my people perish from a lack of knowledge," which we should never shy away from.  While our interpretation is based mostly on Bible Alone, we also recognize that there are entire thoughts of understanding and discussions from early Rabbis and Church Fathers, who lived from the fourth century and earlier,  who had specific training closest to that of the more genuine Apostolic Faith or had solid roots in the Hebraic Faith.  These sources often confirm the Bible more than modern Seminarians or Denominational study guides which are purposed to uphold traditions or opinions, or for the purpose of making money.  However, one must always be cautious to test what is said against scripture to discern if what is written is professing God's clean doctrine.  Some of the books are merely for historical context and useful to support textural witnesses as a 4th or 5th type.  

A List of Books that are helpful: 

• Recognitions of Clement
• Church History by Eusebius
• Dead Sea Scrolls
• Epitome 65, Cassius Dio
• Ascension of Isaiah
• Works of Josephus
• Works of Tacitus
• Works of Tertullian
• Masoretic Text
• Septuagint

Unfortunately, the Christian church has a long history being influenced by groups or governments who have zero interest in doing things God's way and are influenced by the Devil to corrupt the Word of God.  The Bible refers to this as the lying pen of the scribe

(Jer 8:8).  Subversive groups often operate out in the open, under the cover of scholarship, to give the appearance of objectivity and reason, while in the details they lay a snare of clever adjustments of wording, format and occasional removals of entire dialog and context.  Sometimes it involves comments in the margins with dismissive statements to cast doubt on portions of the text or steer discussion off the rails into directions not intended by the book.  One should pay attention to the fact that a large number of books that were formerly called "Bible Canon," even for as long as a thousand years, all seemed to get removed in either the 17th or the late 19th century; which happened just before a number of new wave revival doctrines and trendy denominations appeared on the scene.  The last 150 years boomed from a few dozen church schisms to now having upwards of 40,000 denominations.  We want to encourage everyone to believe the Bible when it says in the last days the whole world will be deceived and many false Christs will appear and we should say to ourselves "do not go to them" or "Come out of her my people!"  This should also establish credibility in what was removed should actually be read with full confidence.    The best way to test if a removed book is equal to scripture is if it either says the same thing as the 66 book Canon or has many direct quotes.  An example of a book that many, many Pastors and "Scholars" insist is not scripture is the Book of Enoch; but Christ quotes it in Matthew 22 and even tells the Pharisees "you do ere not knowing the scriptures!"  The book of Enoch is also quoted in Jude.  Jubilees also has many things to add to the story.  It is interesting that the Ethiopian Bible, which is the oldest original known full Bible includes the book of Enoch.  Enoch was even found in the record of the Dead Sea scrolls.  

 A List of Books that have strong scriptural connection: 

• Book of Enoch
• Book of Jubilees
• Biblical Apocrypha - 14 books
• Epistle of Clement
• Prayer of Azariah

(There may be many more worthy of this honor that are not listed)