East Gippsland Gospel

It can be heard in church, people saying that “you don’t need to go to Bible College, you just read your bible”. Some even go so far as to claim that commentaries and the likes are unnecessary.

It disturbs me when I hear the inference that scholarship is ‘not spiritual’ and that those who pursue it are somehow ‘just being nerds’ and lacking passion for the ‘true work’ of the Gospel.

Jesus endorsed that it is right to love God with “all our mind” (Luke 10:27), this indicates some mental exertion; perhaps called “scholarship”.

If you are reading a Bible in a language other than Hebrew and Greek, thank scholars.

If you use the margin notes, links to other texts, and other references in your Bible, thank scholars.

If you understand the primary doctrines of the Gospel, doctrines of God, doctrines of the Church etc, then thank the scholars down through the last two millennia who gave themselves to bringing clarity.

Yes, there are scholars who are “unspiritual”, there are even Bible scholars who are not Christians, but our role is to interact with what is taught and reject the error, not to reject scholarship outright.

We all build on the knowledge of those who have gone before, and it is arrogant to say, “I can do it alone with the just Bible” (and often it is added, “with the Holy Spirit”).

As none of us perfectly hear God’s voice, that is a certain way to end up with a god of one’s own making.