Bible Study Magazine—September–October 2009 Issue

Overview

Bible Study Magazine now by purchasing the Mar-Apr 2009 Back Issue for $3.95. That’s 20% off the newsstand price of $4.95!

Bible Study Magazine is a brand new print magazine (not an e-magazine) published by Lexham Press. Six times a year, Bible Study Magazine delivers tools and methods for Bible study, as well as insights from respected teachers, professors, historians, and archeologists.

Read pastor profiles, author interviews, and stories of individuals whose thoughtful engagement with Scripture has shaped their thinking and defined their ministries. Bible Study Magazine reveals the impact of God’s Word on their lives and the power of Scripture in yours.

Each Issue of Bible Study Magazine Includes:

• Feature Stories
  Discover new ways to connect the Bible with your ministry and life through reading great interviews with and articles from the biggest names in the church and biblical scholarship.
• Bible Study Tips
  Thoughtful and engaging authors tackle the tough passages in Scripture, explain difficult concepts, and confront complex interpretations in a way that helps God’s Word make sense to your life.
• On the Cutting Edge
  Keep up-to-date on the latest news in biblical research, including archaeological and historical findings.
• A New Kind of Bible Study
  Encounter God by yourself or with other believers with an ongoing Bible study in each issue.
• On Teaching
  Get advice on how to preach or teach the Bible in any setting from well-known pastors and teachers who use the Bible every day.
• Tool Box
  Learn how to effectively use the latest Bible study tools with our how-to guides.
• In the News
  Keep informed about the latest news in biblically-related topics, discoveries, and events.
• Thoughts from the Ancients
  Read the Bible along with those who have come before you, and learn from the wisdom of the early church—in their own words.
• Word Studies
  Get a close-up view of the Bible! Each issue contains insights about specific words found in the Bible, and tutorials on how to do word studies.
• If Only Someone Would Explain It to Me
  Enrich your understanding of the Bible with explanations of biblical and theological concepts by top scholars.
• Did You Know?
  Discover interesting facts about the Bible in the contemporary and ancient world.
• What They Don’t Tell You in Church
  See things you never noticed in biblical passages you have read dozens of times.
• Biblical Humor
  The funniest stories and the best comics related to the Bible, useful for any setting.
• Book Reviews
  Stay on top of the latest books about Bible study. Each issue contains reviews of the books and commentaries to equip you in your study of God’s Word.

Excerpts from the Mar-Apr 2009 Issue!

Transmitting the Word: An Interview with John Piper on Consistency and Community

Dr. Piper learned how to study the Bible at Fuller Theological Seminary. After completing his doctoral work at the University of Munich, he taught for six years at Bethel College in St. Paul, Minnesota. In 1980, he took the call as Senior Pastor (now called Pastor for Preaching and Vision) at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis.

In 1994, fourteen years into his pulpit ministry, Piper unveiled the vision of a resource ministry called Desiring God. The ministry offers Piper’s sermons and writings, as well as other resources, free for personal use.

Dr. Piper’s influence is considerable. With over 30 published books, including Desiring God, Don’t Waste Your Life, Spectacular Sins, and Finally Alive, he has reached countless people through print. After about three months of tweeting, his Twitter.com posts were being followed by nearly 18,000 people and growing. Nearly 23,000 readers subscribe to his blog and a video featuring him on YouTube has been viewed over 233,000 times.

Piper has transmitted the message of the Bible to countless people around the world, but how does he personally approach the Bible? BSM asked the preacher that question and others in a recent interview.

Drawing On Scripture under Gunfire

"Frankly, it was what got me back and forth through the city streets of Somolia," Struecker says about the Scriptures. "Because I didn’t have time at that point to crack open my Bible and read some of my favorite passages, I went off of what I remembered and that literally gave me the courage to head into gunfire. God gave me an extraordinary sense of peace."

Struecker recounted Jesus' prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, Paul’s thoughts about being apart from the body and present with the Lord and a litany of psalms while walking—and hiding—in the war-torn streets as gunfire and tragedy enveloped him around two downed Black Hawk helicopters.

Meaningless, Unfair, Absurd: Does the Author of Ecclesiastes Need Prozac? by Miles Custis

The author of Ecclesiastes if often labeled a depressed pessimist. But a careful study reveals the author to be an honest—and hopeful—realist about life, not a candidate for Prozac. It’s easy to understand why people think Ecclesiastes is depressing, or think that the conclusion of the book is that life is meaningless. Verses like “And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive” (Eccl 4:2 NIV) make the book seem less than hopeful. Even its famous phrase “vanity of vanities”—found at the beginning and the end of the book (1:2; 12:8) makes the author sound like a complete pessimist. I’ve found, though, that if you give the book enough serious attention, Ecclesiastes reveals that the author is actually hopeful, and his message can easily be applied to each of us.

Sanctified Dirt, by Michael S. Heiser

Elisha’s healing of Naaman the leper, commander of the army of the king of Syria, is a familiar story to many (2 Kings 5:1–17). Naaman hears that Elisha, the prophet of Israel, can heal him, so he makes the trip. When the two meet, Elisha tells him rather dismissively that he needs to take a bath in the Jordan River. Naaman doesn’t take this well and prepares to go home. At the behest of some servants, he consents to dip himself in the Jordan. He is miraculously healed by the simple act. The display of power, so transparently without sacrifice or incantation, awakens Naaman to the fact that Yahweh of Israel is the true God. Here’s where the story usually ends in our telling, but that would result in the omission of one very odd detail—what Naaman asks to take back home.