Category Archives: Read ME!

READ ME IS BACK!

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If you missed the first section of READ ME, have no fear it has returned! We will be kicking off Read me 2 on March 27th and go through April 17th.

Read Me is an interactive class helping YOU study YOUR Bible and is for ALL ages.

You hear it all the time:

“Know The Word!”
“Study Your Bible!”

But have you ever really learned how to do it? Has anyone ever taught you how? If you were like me a few years ago then the answer would be sadly “no”. Sunday Nights beginning March 27th we are going to change that. Pastor Jason Crandall will be teaching a 4 week class on the basics of Bible Study. The goal at the end of this class is for YOU to be able to open YOUR Bible to ANY passage and see what God has for YOU there. Christians NEED to know the Word. Come join us beginning March 27th @ 6pm and learn how to READ and STUDY your Bible.

Cost: $10 (Includes Material Costs). Childcare is available for age 4 and younger.

You can signup here.

Hope to see you there!

Jason

Read Me 4 – The Last Great Night

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Last night was our last great night of this section of Read Me.  It was a great day with another great turnout.  During our 4 weeks we averaged 113.5 people.  Normally, there’s a huge drop off from week to week.  I’m so thankful for consistency in this class.  I hope we’ve learned how to study the Bible and get to know God in bigger and better ways.

We began last night discussing something important: Benefits of Bible Study.  When you study the Bible you receive something.

We moved into looking at the Biblical Genres to help us understand the Bible a little better.  We reviewed the 6 major Biblical Literary Genres (History, Law, Wisdom, Prophecy, Gospels, and Epistles).

After that we got to work and did our stuff and participated in authentic community (aka fellowship).

At the end we discussed some future ideas.

1.  I shared my goal of having 300 people at FBC Pearland go through READ ME!  Imagine what would happen if that many people at our church were unleashed in understanding the Scripture.  Everything could be different.  We would walk in so much more joy and power (see the Benefits of Bible Study).  We had a huge response of people saying that they would recommend it to their friends and family.  Next section will start March 27-April 17.  You can register and pay at FBC Pearland’s Website.  We already have 25 signed up!  If you missed something or missed a couple of classes you can take it again at no cost.  Just register so we know how many tables to setup.

2.  We are going to do a followup class to Read Me called Believe Me that will work as a survey of doctrines (aka teachings) that Christians believe.  More on this soon.  We need to make some decisions, but we should have some answers soon.

3.  I shared another idea about doing a class called Talk To Me which would be a discussion focusing on prayer.  More on this soon as well.

4.  This week I’ll be doing some blogs on the problem passages in 1 John.  Please email me problems you had in interpreting 1 John.  My email address is jcrandall@fbcpearland.org.

This was a great class and can’t thank everyone who participated enough to make this class a huge success.

Christ is all,

Jason

 

 

 

 

Read Me 3 – Another Awesome Night

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We had another excellent night this past Sunday with 115 people in attendance.  We talked about true fellowship in 1 John 1.  We talked about what it looks like, and how last week we participated in true, real, Christian fellowship.  Fellowship  isn’t cookies and punch, basketball, bbq, or softball.  All of those things are great in churches.  All of those things can help facilitate real fellowship, BUT they are not fellowship.  They are not Christian community.  Christian community is believers in Jesus coming around the God’s word together, sharing, discussing, learning, and growing.  I don’t know about anybody else in our Read Me class, but this is my favorite thing to hear God’s people discussing God’s Word.

Which Bible Should I Read?

After our devotion we hopped into a big question that I’ve been getting through the course of our class: Which Bible should I use?  We discussed issues related to the Bible.  Which languages it was written in, how it was translated and then discussed translation style.  The discussion circled around the two main translation styles out there: Dynamic Equivalence (basically, thought for thought) and Essentially Literal (basically, word for word).  I highly recommend translations in the Essentially Literal camp.  This would include:

  • English Standard Version (ESV)
  • New American Standard Bible (NASB)
  • New King James Version (NKJV)
  • King James Version (KJV)

Dynamic Equivalence translations are certainly not evil, but leave a lot up to the translator as to interpretation of passages.  This can be very helpful, but if the translator is off then it can be detrimental as well.  The only Dynamic Equivalence translation that I look at on a regular basis is the New Living Translation (NLT).  It is readable and has good, conservative translators working on it.

There is a middle ground as well that works to combine both sides.  These translation include the New International Version and the Holman Christian Standard Bible.

Here is the handout associated with Which Bible Should I Read? discussion.

The Method: DEMO

After our discussion of the Bible we jumped into a demo of how the method works.  This was simply a review to help people understand how the method is supposed to function.  In a class as large as ours it is sometimes difficult to have everybody understanding exactly the same way.  For those who may night have been practicing the method exactly as taught that’s fine.  The big deal is being in the Word and letting the Word transform you.

Here’s that handout: The Method DEMONSTRATION

Get To Work

Once again we got to work.  Everybody studying where they left off the last time they were in 1 John.  I love a silent room, when the silence is due to people letting God’s word read them.  It was awesome.  Again, though my favorite part was when everybody finishes and the room erupts in true Christian Fellowship centered around God’s Word.  EXCELLENT STUFF!

Here’s the video: http://www.facebook.com/v/490362662023

Resources

We briefly discussed resources and looked into Bible Atlases.  These are excellent books that talk about the geography spoken about in Scripture.  My favorite is the Zondervan NIV Atlas of the Bible.

Looking forward to our last week of READ ME next week.

Christ is all,

Jason

Read Me – Week 2

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Read Me – Week 2 was better than our first week!  117 attendees again with some who couldn’t make it and others who made it for their first time.  It was great. I shared a brief devotion from 1 John 1.9 -2.2 discussing why it is ‘Just” that God forgive our sins.  Looking into verse 2 you can see that it’s justice because Christ stands in our place.  He is the propitiation (the sacrifice that bears God’s wrath and turns it into favor) for our sins.  So when God looks at us if we know Jesus as Savior then God does not see us, but His son who bore wrath already.  Christ is all we have and all we need. Amazing, huh?  All from studying 1 John.

 

Discussions

After that we looked into WHY STUDY THE BIBLE PART 2 and looked at an interesting Manuscript Chart concerning reliability of Scripture as compared to other ancient writings.

So The Method that we learned last week is good, but we need to figure out how to implement it into our daily lives.  So that’s what we talked about in the IMPLEMENTATION OF THE METHOD.

Getting To Work – Profound Silence

Then we got to work.  Everyone was at different places and different places in their studies.  God was good and taught 117 much about 1 John on their own last night.  It’s always amazing when we get to work on personal Bible Study.  You’ve never heard a room of 117 people get so quiet.  The silence is profound.  You can view a video of this silence on my Facebook page.

 

Thunderous Discussion

Then came my favorite part.  I gave the instruction to discuss what you learned in your study with those at your table…The room went from silence to thunderous discussion about the Scripture in a few seconds.  This was awesome.  This was amazing.  This brought tears to my eyes as God’s people didn’t just study the Scripture, but had AUTHENTIC fellowship (this will be a blog soon) around the Word of God.  It was FANTASTIC!

 

Resources

Then we talked about some helpful resources.

In terms of reliability of Scripture we focused on Case for Faith by Lee Strobel, Case for Christ by Lee Strobel, and Carm.org.

As we talked about Bible Study helps we looked at some simple commentaries.  These commentaries are to HELP you interpret the Scripture not do it for you.

I had a GREAT question by one of our participants.  She asked, “Would you recommend buying the ESV Study Bible first before any commentaries?” The answer is a resounding YES!  The reason being a study bible is going to give you helpful notes on many passages of the Bible.  Commentaries are more for specific studies.  If you want to go down deep into a book of the Scripture, REALLY deep then get a commentary on it.  If you want some helpful notes in your interpretation then get a great study bible.  I RECOMMEND THE ESV STUDY BIBLE. If you didn’t know that already ;-)

Christ is all,

Jason

PS. Audio coming soon.

Read Me – Week 1

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We kicked off READ ME last night at FBC Pearland.  117 people showed up for our first Read Me class.  We are at capacity, which is incredible as I’d expected maybe 8 people to signup when I decided to offer the class.  We discussed Part 1 of Why We Study The Bible.  Then we looked at My Method and immediately got to work on 1 John.  It was incredible to watch as 117 people with varying ages from grade school into their 70s studied God’s Word in one room.  Some pictures are below.  We worked through 1 John 1.1-4 and journaled what God was saying to us there.  Then we discussed some resources that would be helpful in Bible Study.

We highlighted three study bibles:

We also discussed some good websites that will help in bible study:

Yes, there is homework.  We tiered it based on how frequently one read the Bible currently.  We don’t want this to be overwhelming, but an encouraging and growing experience.

The goal is to have my talk from last night up on my Audio Channel today, but we had some recording issues.  So that will require prayer!

 

Christ is all,

Jason