Why We Need the Scriptures

John 20:31 tells us that, "...These things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name."

When we contemplate the Word, the vastness of the revelation of God... do we realize that every single part of it has been curated and picked by the Lord for the purpose of bringing us to belief and that belief would bring us to life in Jesus? This Word is designed to reveal the character of Yahweh, the glory of His Son and His sacrifice, and the nature of His Spirit. It is written to warn us about sin, the consequence of rejecting the Lord, and how to respond and repent when we are convicted. 

No matter where you are in your walk with Jesus, my prayer is that today's episode encourages you and reminds you that the God of the universe and the word He has given us can be trusted, believed, lived out, and loved. That it has the power to transform us because not only is it the written Word, but it leads us to the Living Word, Jesus Himself. 

Scriptures Referenced:

• John 20:30-31
• John 21:24-25
• The Books of Judges, Job, and Psalms
• John 14:6
• John 17:3
• John 10
• John 6
• John 1:1
• Hebrews 4:12
• Galatians 2:20
• 1 Thessalonians 5:24

You can find me on Instagram / Threads

Transcript

Carrie 0:05

Hey everyone, welcome to a brand new episode of Honey from the Rock. I am Carrie, your host, and I am so glad you're here. And this week I am jumping into a few verses out of John 20, because oftentimes there are things when I when I'm trying to plan an episode, things that I'm trying to work through, or you know, there's places in my life where I'm wrestling with the Lord or studying the word. And there are certain things that I like to keep between the Lord and I because either I know he's saying it's not time to share them yet, or I haven't come out the other side in a way that is mature for lack of a better way to put it. You know, there are some times when it's it's still, like I said last week, still pretty, pretty not cute over here, my friends. But um, I am in the process of going through a precept upon precept study with my dear friend Tarol. And shout out to my my my dear friend Taryl. She is amazing. We've known each other for 22 years, uh, which is half her life, almost half mine. So, because I'll be 44 this year. Wow, that's insane. Oh, I can't believe those words just came out of my mouth. Anyway, moving on, we are studying the Gospel of John. And if you have not studied Precept Upon Precept, it's one of my it's it's the inductive Bible study method. It is one of my favorite ways to study scripture. I I love the instruction that Kay gives us. I really appreciate that she asks great questions for us to study the word, to dig deeper. I was telling a friend over the weekend that I really appreciate, for the most part, from what I've seen, and I've done several of her studies, that she's not trying to lead us to her doctrine, but she is really trying to help us study the word well and to study the word in its historical and cultural context, but also study it with an eye towards where is the Lord dealing with us? Where is he convicting us? Where do we need to repent? How is he revealing himself? What is the section that we're studying say about his character, his person, how he has revealed himself in the world, and those kinds of things. So I highly recommend the precept upon precept method. If you want to learn more about it, you can go to precept.org and check out the Bible studies, check out the philosophy of the inductive study uh method. I I just love it. But we are going through John, and in the process, one of the things that we were studying is not just reading through John one multiple times, which we are doing, but we are she leads us in different cross-references. And one of the things that she that Kay really emphasizes, which has been helpful to me and has taught me how to look for this throughout different books of scripture, is what is the author and author's intent in writing this particular letter or this particular historical count account? And sometimes it's really obvious, and sometimes it's not as obvious. But these verses out of John 20, which is John 20, 30 through 31, John really succinctly states why he's written his gospel. And I will tell you, I I chuckled a little bit when she said to go read these verses because when I was young, when I was, I think seven or eight, I was in a Christmas pageant. I believe I was an angel. Um, and my sister Callie was as well. We were part of the angelic chorus. Uh, it was a Christmas pageant that literally just took verses out of scripture, out of the Christmas story, out of the gospels, and put them to music. Which, you know, if you have children, you can imagine how delightful that was. However, I will say that I remember almost all of those songs from that Christmas pageant. I will not sing them for you. You are welcome. And um, but one of them that we memorized was John 20, 31. And so I'm going to read this scripture because Kay's like in here. John cited his purpose for why he's written his gospel. And, you know, I'm singing this song in my head. But as I was singing, I was like, you know, Lord, this is a song that I, you know, I can I can say these verses from from my heart, like from my mind. I I know them. But as I'm studying John, as I'm reading John 1, as I'm digging into this gospel, I want fresh eyes. You know, it's great that I remember these verses from a song I sang as a child, but I don't want to be stuck in this rote. Um, oh, I already know what this chapter says. Like, you know, I've read it a lot. And so, you know, I kind of get the gist of this, and I can kind of just breeze through this first week of study. I don't, I don't want to do that. And had asked the Lord to really help me read John 1 and read these verses from John 20 with just a fresh perspective. And so I will read them to you and then I will talk about what the Lord has showed me, and I just think it's really cool, and I pray it encourages you. So John 20, 30 through 31 says, Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book, but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. So, I mean, like it sounds in when I worked in PR, we had a boilerplate, right? That you would put at the bottom of every press release that kind of just gave the organization history, you know, short organizational history, purpose, this is why we exist, kind of thing. And that's you know, that's how these two verses kind of read. Like, this is John's boilerplate. The Lord did a lot of miracles, um, he did a lot of signs in the midst of his disciples um that I haven't written down, but here's what I have written down, and this is the purpose. But as I was reading this, it it really like what's what popped out to me was the phrase there are many things that Jesus did that are not written in this book, but these things are written so that you may believe. And the emphasis that I that the Holy Spirit put on these things are written. Now, these verses come in the context right after the Lord appears to Thomas in the midst of the disciples, because all of the other disciples had seen Jesus except for Thomas. I think Thomas, it scripture says it was eight days after the resurrection of Jesus that Thomas saw the Lord, right? Because he had been telling everybody, I won't believe that he's resurrected unless I can put my fingers in the holes in his hands and see the and place my hand in his side. And eight days later, the Lord shows up and says, Put, go ahead, put your finger here, see my hands, put your hand out, place it in my side, do not disbelieve, but believe. And that's when Thomas falls to his knees and says, My Lord and my God. And and Jesus says to him, Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed. And then John writes these two verses that I'm talking about. And as I as I again, as I was reading them, it it probably just seems so minuscule, and I can't convey the way that my heart leapt when all of a sudden I realized like the intentionality of the Father, of Jesus, of the Holy Spirit, to say there are so many things that Jesus did. There are signs he did in the midst of his disciples, but we can even zoom out and look at the gospel of John and see everything that John recorded, that Jesus said, and that he did, and that he taught, and to say, these things have been written down for what purpose that you would believe? Well, what that we would believe what? That Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. But I love that John also takes it a step further and says, and that by believing you may have life in his name. And I know there is a lot of conversation, debate. There is a spectrum in America about whether or not the Bible is the inerrant word of God. There are people who reject it straight out of hand and don't believe that it is. There are people who revere scripture and say that it's, you know, it's definitely a book about God, but it's not necessarily divinely inspired. It's an inspirational book. It inspires us, but it was not inspired. And then there is the uh doctrinal, theological, his Christian, historical Christianity standard belief that the Bible is the inerrant word of God. It cannot be added to it. You know, it the canon is closed, we can't add anything to it. This is what the Lord has, this is how the Lord has chosen to reveal himself through scripture. And uh just thinking about these things were written, and I I I have been noodling on this and chewing on it and thinking about it because it goes to show that in the context of all of history, in the context of every human that the Lord knows will walk this planet from the very beginning, Adam and Eve, all the way through to the last human being, before he returns and sets up a new heaven and a new earth. He he knew exactly what needed to go into his word, into all of scripture, into the gospel of John, into the selection of the ways that he chose to manifest himself to his disciples. The Lord's intention to say, these are the things that you will write down for the purpose of drawing people to me. And it's what's mind-blowing to me is the care that that takes, the intentionality of the Lord. It it shows us how strategic the Lord is, for lack of a better way to put it, in what he chose. It shows the perfection of what is written in the Gospel of John. And again, pulling that even out even more, what is what is written in scripture, that every single word, every single comma and semicolon and parenthesis and quotation mark, every single word inspired by the Holy Spirit into the 40, the 40 authors of scripture, over I can't remember how many thousand, like 1500 years. Forgive me if that's the wrong span of time. It's probably a little bit more than that. But anyway, the just the intentionality to say these are the things that I have chosen, so that no matter who reads it, no matter what their personality is, no matter what their history is or what they've experienced, no matter where they are in history, whether it's 1102 or 1563 or 2026, that scripture, scripture holds the fullness of revelation that that spans thousands of years. And that also that witness is constant and unchanging. And I think sometimes because, especially in the Western church, I mean, I I don't know, I don't know about you, but I own several Bibles and I have several different translations that I can read. I have access to the internet where I can then get my hands on even more translations of scripture. I can read tons of commentaries, I can use lexicons, I can do all sorts of things to dig into the word, and yet it there are just there are times when it's just like, I don't want to read the Bible. Right? Like we treat it as common. And I'm not saying that we always have to come to the word in excitement and you know, absolute delightment, delightment, delight, delight over, you know, like I get to read the Bible today. But at the same time, shouldn't there be that that humble, joyful expectation from each of us that in our hands we hold the written word of God that leads us to the living word of God, which is the person of Jesus Himself, as John says in John 1. I I'm re- I've been really challenged by Jesus in my disposition towards the word. Because I I I do I love the word. I I think it is amazing, and only the Lord could have done it, how it cross-references itself and it speaks to deeper things, and you can read it on the surface and gain so much, and yet it is mysterious and it is eternal, and there are things that we will spend eternity still understanding and discovering about the Lord, and yet there are times when I look at it as just a book rather than the way that the Lord has chosen to reveal himself so that I would have the opportunity to come to know him and to read about him, and and by reading about him, would actually come to know him as God, as as the Holy Spirit, as Jesus, who is both man and the son of God, God incarnate, and that by believing in him, not only do I just get to believe about him, but that I actually get to have life in his name. I actually get to not stay the way I am, but that the things that the Lord has chosen, the things that the Lord had men write over thousands of years and put into the holy scripture, they were chosen, they were intentional, they are perfect, they are inerrant, they and they all point to a a holy and righteous God who desires for us to know him and desires for us to come to him and wants us to know his son and wants us to be to be walking in in his spirit, but also in his faithfulness and in his goodness shows us the consequences of not believing, shows us the consequences of not of rejecting him. It's all in there, and that the Lord's given us the word, he is these things are written that you may believe. We see that they're written, and I like that John says, like what's written here is so that you may believe. The onus is still on us. Are we going to choose to believe what is written in scripture? Are we going to trust the character of God, the character of our Father who sent his son, the character of the Son who was willing to be sent and to come down and to preach the Father's gospel and to live it out to the utmost obedience to death, even death on a cross, that he would conquer death, he would conquer the grave, that he would open the way to the Father, that there would, that the way would be opened for us to be sent the Holy Spirit, that instead of going to a temple, we can become the temple of the living God, that the things that so easily beset us, the sins that are so particular to each of us because of how we're made and our personalities and and our and our carnal adamic nature, that those things can not only be we can repent of them and surrender them, but that we are literally transformed, that we don't have to stay as we are in misery and in sin and and separated from him. These things were written, these things are written that we would believe that Jesus is the Christ, he's the Messiah, and he is the Son of God. And again, I love that John tacks on here at the end of chapter 20, and that so you start in belief, but that in your belief you may grow into having life in his name. And that is so important because the reminder is here that it's not just enough to believe that Jesus is the Son of God, but our belief in the Lord and our surrender to him, our obedience to lay down our lives at his command and say, This life that I live in the flesh, I want, I, as Paul says in Galatians 2.20, I want to live by the faith of Jesus, the one who loves me and has given himself for me. I don't want to just stop and and intellectually say, Oh yeah, Jesus was the Messiah. Jesus was the Son of God. And and that's cool, and that's enough. No, if we believe that Jesus is the son of God, if we believe that he is Messiah, that very belief has to spring forth within us new life. Jesus says in John 3, you must be born again. Think about that in the context of what he's saying here. These things are written that you would believe. You know, Nicodemus didn't understand it. He's like, wait, are you saying that I have to crawl back up at like, I mean, just some of the things that get put in scripture just, I mean, sometimes make me laugh and sometimes are just like make me have serious secondhand embarrassment. And then I'm like, why are you feeling that way, Carrie? You probably would have thought the same thing. Like you're no different than than the people who didn't understand. You know, like, what do you mean, born again? What what do you mean? Like, unless you but unless you have faith as a little child, you cannot enter the kingdom of Kevin. What do you mean by that, Lord? What do you mean unless you pick up your cross, deny yourself, and follow me? You you can't be my disciple. You're not worthy of me. Unless your love for me makes the love that you have for father, mother, husband, wife, brother, sister, children, your own, yes, in your own life also look like hatred, you're not worthy of me. Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no part of me. These these things are written that we would believe. And everything that has been written down in this book, in the whole of scripture, in the gospel of John, in the account of Jesus' crucifixion, burial, and resurrection, every single thing, its whole underlying foundational purpose is that we would come to true saving belief that because Jesus is who he said he is, and he is who he says he is, and I believe him, that I am free to surrender the shackles of this life to him and walk in newness of life, and and to have life in his name. I mean, the name of Jesus has such power because it is the person of Jesus. And I I sometimes in in Christian circles, I think we toss around the name of Jesus, and and in some ways it's almost separate from his very person, which which seems weird. Weird because I can't be separate from my own name. Like I'm known as Carrie. I'm not nameless or faceless. Like when you say my name, if you know me in real life, or even through this podcast, like you can hear my voice. You've heard some of my personality. You hear my inflections. If you know me in person, you you can conjure up my face, what I look like, interactions that we've had. And it sometimes it seems like in in the Christian church, we're so consumed with the name of Jesus that we forget that the name of Jesus has power because of his person. We can't separate the two. The name of Jesus means nothing if it's not connected to the Son of God. And that probably seems like a moot point or like I'm I'm splitting hairs, but if we're going to do things in the name of Jesus, we need to make sure we know the person that that name is attached to. We need to have the same experience that I just talked about. If if you know me in real life. And I understand we can't conjure up the way he looked, but we can we can think about ways that he's moved in our life. We can think about his love, his compassion, his correction, his discipline, his joy, his patience, his goodness, his kindness, his his intolerance for sin, and yet his grace to forgive sinners and to transform us. And and I I again I want to encourage us to see the connection. These things are written about Jesus so that we would believe that he is the Christ, the Son of God, and that in our belief we would have life in him, that we would see that it's not enough just to say, yeah, I think that Jesus was the Messiah, but our belief has to move into true faith and and it has to move us into a place where we say, because Jesus is the Messiah, because Jesus is the Son of God, I can have real, true life. I can have, I can walk with my life overflowing with the rivers of living water that Jesus talks about. I can I in him believing in him and having life in his name means I'm coming to him and I am shedding the burdens of this life and finding rest for my weary soul, as he says in Matthew 11. And I am taking on his yoke and I am learning of him. I'm seeing, I'm learning his meekness and his lowliness of heart. I'm learning how to have holy spiritual, righteous zeal with holy spiritual and biblical knowledge. So that I'm not unrighteously out there swinging a sword and unrighteously judging people, but I'm I'm righteously only by the Holy Spirit, only by the blood of Jesus, righteously passionate for the things of God in my own life and then also in the lives of people that I care about and the lives of people that I'm called to. I I it was when I read this verse, it was just one of those moments where it was where the Holy Spirit, I know, opened, opened the eyes of my soul to show me, like, Carrie, these things are written. We could, you know, John says in in John 21, now there were many other things that Jesus did, that if I had written them all down, all of the books and all of the world, and all the libraries and all the world could not contain them. That's that's a staggering thing to think about. You know, we have a microcosm of Jesus' life. We get his birth, we get a snapshot at 12, and we get three to three and a half years of ministry. And then and then he goes. And that when we choose to believe Jesus and we choose to believe in him, we get new life in him. At the end of John 21, John writes, This is the disciple who is bearing witness about these things and who has written these things, and we know that his testimony is true. And like I said just a couple minutes ago, now there are also many things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. And that I love that because it going back to these verses in John 20, these things were carefully selected by the Lord to give us everything that we need for life and godliness. This this scripture holds the perfect revelation that we need in this life to walk out discipleship, to lose our life to him, to know when we are sinning against him and violating his word and need to repent, to recognize the conviction of the Holy Spirit, and to recognize his leading, to rec, you know, as Jesus says in John 10, I am the good shepherd, my sheep hear my voice, and another they will not listen to. These things have been written so that we would know Jesus, not just as Messiah, but as this, as the son of the living God, as the one who saves our souls, but also as the friend who sticks closer than a brother, as the king of kings and the lord of lords, and the alpha and the omega, and and yet as the shepherd who who walks alongside us, whose rod and staff comforts us. And and I want I want to encourage you that if you are struggling with the word, and and again, friends, I have been in so many seasons where it has, I have had a wrong disposition towards the word. I have had difficulty getting in the word and wrestled with being in it, and it's been dry and it hasn't, even though the word is living and active, I have felt like I'm just reading it and all I can read are just words in a page. I don't feel any stirring in my spirit or in my heart. And yet I look back, and those are seasons that I am grateful for because it reminds me that that it doesn't change the truth of the word. It doesn't change its character, it doesn't change its makeup, it doesn't change its purpose. And that even if there are seasons where I'm wrestling, where I'm wrestling to read or I'm wrestling to understand, that if I if I keep coming to Jesus, if I keep coming to the Father, if I keep coming to the Holy Spirit in in the word, and I keep asking and fighting, that the Lord will, the Lord will continue to open his word to me. He will make it living and active in me, and to not despair in seasons where it simply doesn't tangibly feel that way. But to trust that when I'm faithful to respond to the Lord and his draw to keep coming to us, he I was saying it to a friend this morning. He who has called us, he is the one who is faithful, he will do it. Obedience is on me. I need to keep showing up. I, even when I don't feel like it, even when I'm wrestling, and and even more so in times of spiritual abundance and joy, to keep going and just to stick in the back of our heads, friends, when we hold this book, when we hold this word and and and we read it, that we would remember that this is the the whole of scripture was intentionally curated by Yahweh, intentionally curated by Jesus, by the Holy Spirit. They intentionally picked the things, the the books of poetry, the psalms of agony, the book of Job, the miracle of feeding the four and five thousand, the woman at the well, Mary Magdalene proclaiming his resurrection to the disciples, the the miracles and the works of the Holy Spirit through Paul and Peter and James and John and the other disciples in Acts, the way that Paul dealt with his churches, the difficult things, the consequences of sin that we see with David, with Saul, with Moses, with um with the Israelites in the book of Judges, all of it together was picked by the Lord for us to be able to read and to see that Jesus is exactly who he has told us he is. And that when we come to him and we say, Lord, I believe, help my unbelief, but I believe in you, Jesus, that that belief then spurs us on to shed the shackles of this life, to war, to be free, to trust the Lord in his character, and that we would have life, that we would have life in his name. John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. That's what Jesus says. And so, my friend, it's it's it's time, it's it sometimes it seems so minuscule, and yet it was the reminder and the challenge, the challenge from the Lord to me to deepen my belief, to remember that when I am going through times of of deep spiritual warfare, or times of challenge and agony, or times of grief and and devastation, that when I come to this word, even though I might not feel some type of way, or I might be wrestling, or I'm whatever it is, or I might be struggling with sin, and there's sin that has blinded me to seeing the truth of the word, whatever it is, and wherever I'm at, the truth of the word has not changed. Its purpose has not changed. And I can trust every single Holy Spirit-inspired word in this book that reveals to me the character of Yahweh, that reveals to me the character and the work of his son on the cross, that reveals to me the purpose and the work of the Holy Spirit, as he leads me into all truth, as he convicts me of my sin, as as he leads me in the paths of righteousness, and as he does all of those things for you. And so, my friend, as as we walk as sojourners and aliens in this world and in this life, as we are called in the midst of a people who don't know the Lord, who are openly hostile to Jesus and and and openly hostile to his people, let us hold fast, let us stand firm, knowing that the word of the Lord is true, the word of the Lord cannot be changed, that he is faithful, that he is good, and we can trust in his book what he tells us about himself. And as we trust him and we believe him and we walk in newness of life, that that we will actually come to know as Jesus prayed in John 17, that we will actually come to know the one true God and Jesus Christ, whom he sent to preach his gospel, to be crucified on a cross, to be beaten and whipped and spit on a to give up his last breath as man and be buried and yet burst forth in glorious resurrection on that third day, that you and I would have the chance to be redeemed and walk in newness of life. Amen.