Welcome to the For the Gospel podcast. My name is Kosti Hinn, and I have the pleasure of being your host. For the Gospel is all about providing sound doctrine for everyday people. And on today's episode, I want to explain three dangers of not knowing your Bible to put to bed this idea that not interacting with scripture and not knowing your Bible is sort of benign, and that it's the pastor's job to put you on the bus and drive you all the way to heaven, and that you can interact with scripture here and there, but overall, your pastors will do the job, and you don't really need to be a Bible expert per se, and everything's gonna be okay. It's not. It is a dangerous game to play, not interacting with God's word and knowing, truly knowing your Bible. I was sitting recently with a wonderful friend who left Mark Driscoll's church in the midst of all the horrific abuses and manipulation going on again right now at Trinity Church. I pastor in the Phoenix area, and Driscoll's not far from where I pastor, and I keep meeting people and running into people who have had these experiences there. And one of the things that I asked about was how he pulls the wool over the eyes of his followers. They described it this way: that Mark leads with personal manipulation rather than biblical revelation. I'll say that again. Leaders like Mark included lead with personal manipulation rather than biblical revelation. What does that look like and sound like? Well, it's a leader who says, God told me. God didn't tell me that, so you can't do that. God told me this, so you're gonna do this. God told me, God told me, God told me. Abusive and manipulative leaders and false teachers are banking on biblical illiteracy to keep their followers blind. They keep people dependent because the more people know their Bible, the more their eyes are gonna be open to the truth. They're gonna hear a false teacher or a manipulating leader say something and go, no, no, no, that's not true. But so many people are under the guise of these leaders who are domineering, they're influential, or they're the leader of a growing church, and so they walk on water seemingly. But what if you and I were different? What if we woke up to the dangers of being biblically illiterate? And while we respect our pastors and were thankful to be fed by our pastors, we were still discerning parishioners who could wield the sword of the spirit. What if we could learn from wise leaders while never leaving our Berean mentality outside the door? You remember the Bereans in Acts 17, 11, that they were searching the scriptures daily to see if, quote, these things were so, these things being the truths they had been presented with, which makes you think that even early church leaders, including the Apostle Paul, had his teaching scrutinized and analyzed because the goal of every believer is to know the truth and the truth of God's word. Modern-day Christian culture is obsessed with experience. The Bible and Jesus himself have become a footnote. And while people will say, oh, truth is so important, what we're seeing is that experience in many people's minds trumps truth. You'll hear modern mystics claim, you know, we owe the world an encounter. They're referring to their ability to help people experience some special anointing from God. One faith healer said recently, the cross to me isn't a revelation of my sin, it's a revelation of my value. He doesn't want to talk about sin. He doesn't want to deal with objective truth with statements like that. God's word is being grossly misrepresented. And instead of challenging the divorce of truth from experience, the church at large has embraced an experiential type of Christianity, not that experience is bad, but here's what I mean. Experience has become the preeminent proof of spiritual maturity. He who says or she who says, God told me, wins the crowd. Man-centered experience and man-centered gospels are sweeping across the landscape of evangelicalism, and people love it. It's an uphill battle in the church today. It's a marathon fight, but we never stop calling the world back to the timeless truth of God's word. And so I ask you, Christian, do you know your Bible? Do you use scripture accurately and confidently? Do you trust your subjective impressions or the objective truth of God's word? Do you mostly lean on sentiments like, well, I think and I feel and I don't really know, but I feel like? Or do you point people to God's truth and do you stand on God's truth? Do you find yourself able to discern false teachings because you know the truth of God's word? The way you answer those questions provides you with an accurate gauge of how useful you are right now and effective you are right now in fighting the good fight of faith. And I'll tell you this right now: if you're somebody who's in our audience, I want you to be useful. Every one of our contributors and everybody on our team wants you to be a useful Christian. There's no need for you to sit on the sidelines while everybody else is seemingly effective. You can know your Bible too. But it starts with realizing it is a very, very slippery slope and a dangerous game to play, not knowing God's word. How else will you know God's will for your life? God's voice is not the whisper in your head or the wind blowing in your hair. It's the Bible. And it's knowledge that you need to survive and thrive if we call ourselves a Christian. Charles Spurgeon once said from his pulpit, to live by impressions is oftentimes to live the life of a fool, and even to fall into downright rebellion against the revealed word of God. Not your impressions, but that which is in this Bible must always guide you to the law and to the testimony. If it is not according to this word, the impression comes not from God. It may proceed from Satan or from your own distempered brain. Our prayer must be order my steps in your word. Now that, the rule of life, the written word of God, we ought to study and obey. Some people think that knowing the Bible is just about being a super Christian who can thump everybody over the head with their jaw-dropping knowledge, but that's just egotism. That's not the point either. The Pharisees knew a lot about the law, a lot of good that did them. Knowing the Bible is about knowing your God and therefore establishing your life and your worship on who God is. The what is good to know. The why is equally as important. And so what? Hey, know God's word. Why? Well, because when we don't know God's word, we are susceptible to some very serious dangers. And so I want to give you some more whys in this episode. Here are three dangers of not knowing how to use your Bible in these experience-driven times where manipulative leaders are hoping you don't hear an episode like this. Number one, you are easy prey for false teachers or for predators, we'll say. When you don't know your Bible, you're easy prey. You ever watch one of those animal shows where the hungry lion creeps in the tall grass of the African savannah while an impala peacefully grazes? The lion has the perfect strategy in play as he blends into the grass and silently inches closer and closer. And when it seems like the Impala is done for, their head perks up, somehow they hear the lion, and they're gone before the lion can hit full stride. What saves the Impala's life in those moments? It's those big ears and that lightning quick leap. It allows them to cover 30 feet in a single bound. It's a beautiful design by our creator to level the playing field a little bit. They could hear a pin drop in a hailstorm with those ears. They could be from home plate to first base in three hops. That gives them a fighting chance against a roaring lion. Are you seeing the picture? That's the exact picture of what a Christian armed with God's word can do. An impala without big ears is like you without your big Bible. You are lion lunch. So look to God's word. Arm yourself with it. It is your defense system. When you think about the armor of God in Ephesians chapter 6, verses 11 to 18, did you know that every single piece of that armor is defensive, including the sword of the spirit, but the sword of the spirit is also the only offensive weapon. It doesn't just defend against the enemy, but it also assaults the enemy. You need to know God's word for both defensive and offensive, thriving in your faith. False teachers, again, are banking on biblical illiteracy to exploit you in their greed. 2 Peter 2 3 says that. They want to establish abusive power. They want to do Satan's bidding. So a Christian without a growing knowledge of the word of God is easy prey. But one who knows God's word is able to discern when God's word is being twisted. If your mind is rooted in Scripture, it can't be tossed here and there by every wave and wind of doctrine, like Ephesians 4.14 says, including the trickery of men and the craftiness of their deceitful scheming. Doesn't that sound like so many false teachers today? So you got to ask the Holy Spirit to illumine your eyes to the truth, open your mind, grant you wisdom. James 1.5 says we should ask God for wisdom and he'll give it liberally. He'll provide wisdom. We ask in faith, trusting he'll do it because he said he would in his word. And so we want to understand not knowing our Bible makes us easy prey. If you've ever asked the question, man, why am I going through this, or why do I keep falling for this, or why this and why that? And it has to do with you falling prey to the wrong kind of people or the wrong kind of leaders. I know this might hurt and it might seem a little intense, but I say it in love. Look in the mirror, friend. Perhaps your lack of biblical knowledge is what God is trying to expose in your life, so you will start to learn how to wield that sword. He loves you so much that he will expose your weakness in order to strengthen you in your faith. Number two, when you don't know your Bible, you can't help anybody else. What do you call a person who can't swim but jumps into a pool to save a drowning friend? You just fill in the blank. Your words not going to be useful or helpful or effective or powerful. No. Instead, your word choice may be useless or unhelpful or in vain. So it is with the person who's not growing in their use of the Bible, but we're growing in our use of opinion. You know, well, here's what I think you should do, or here's what I found, you know, was helpful once, and we don't go to God's word. We're like somebody who's trying to help a drowning victim, but we can't even swim ourselves. And how many want to help people? I do. I know so many of you do. And so when we don't know our Bible, it's not just about not knowing some information. When we need answers and people need answers, we can't even give them the answers they need. If Christians don't continually devote themselves to internalizing the wisdom of God's word, they're aimlessly dependent at sort of wild stabs. So drop the self-help books, give up on your own opinion. Your experiences may be helpful, but they are not divinely inspired. Give people God's word. That's how you can help them. That's the greatest rescue operation you could ever be on. Not to save people with your own thoughts and your own opinions, but with God's word, and especially with the gospel. When answers to life's toughest questions arise, only the timeless wisdom of God's word will do. Divine wisdom is what people need. Just recently I was driving home and listening to a popular radio program. It's one of the more listened to Christian talk shows, and I was finding myself increasingly cross-eyed while listening to this influential host really use his really large platform with useless interpretations of the Bible and within of his opinion and going on and on and on, all in the name of Jesus, but not every once referring to Scripture. Now, to be fair, the host doesn't claim to be a pastor, but this same issue has invaded the pastoral leadership of evangelicalism as well. Pastors can get hired at a church because they've got an inside buddy who's a shot collar on the team, or some get hired because of how many followers they have on Twitter or Instagram. Some of them get hired because they built big businesses and the church now wants them to build a big church. Pastors can get hired for all sorts of shallow reasons. And pastors can get hired at a church without even knowing their Bible. The qualifications of 1 Timothy 3, 1 through 7 and Titus 1, 5 to 9 include a pastor, a leader, an overseer who is, quote, able to teach. Our leaders need to know their Bibles. We need to know our Bibles. And so when Christian leaders and pastors can do little more but paraphrase some axioms, they sound like fortune cookies, they say, Well, I think, and you know, they're just giving you platitudes that are from this world. We need an otherworldly kind of wisdom. We need divine revelation from God. We don't need any more celebrity Christians who slosh around in the mushy middle of evangelicalism with a pocket knife in their hand. The world needs men and women of God who can take up the sword of the Spirit and wield it as a faithful soldier for Christ. Number three, and finally, when you and I don't know our Bible, we are sinking. What do I mean by that? Well, it when we don't know our Bible, we're on a sinking ship. Our life is going down. We're going to get overwhelmed. We're above our heads. The water has risen and we can't swim. That is, either our church or our own life is sinking. And you can try to pull a Jonah all you want and toss things overboard and bail water out one bucket at a time. You can pray your heart out, but that ship is going down, and only all-out devotion to the sufficiency of Scripture can save it. That's why God gave us the Bible. It's a lifeline. You know, this is nothing new to the church. Mega Church was on the cutting edge of Christianity for decades, packing it out, seating with 10,000 people plus, drawing in people from all walks of life, best-selling books on church growth and leadership. There was just one growing problem that they had. If you know the story about Willow Creek, you remember it. They had a biblically illiterate congregation. Bill Highballs was a master builder. He was a CEO. He was smooth as butter. A really great communicator. Knew how to connect with the business folks, real influencer, had all the axioms this world could ever want. In the end, biblical illiteracy sunk the ship. They took a survey and found that their people were biblically illiterate. And so they did some soul searching way back when and they decided, well, we need to grow this church up now. We need to get stronger in the word. Well, that never happened. They didn't put their hands to the plow in a way that was faithful, and in the end, Highbulls and Willow Creek, like so many before, fell. They sunk. The Bible speaks so loudly to the kind of earthly wisdom that does not produce lasting spiritual fruit. But God's word and God's word rightly preached and God's word honored, it will produce, it will last. Churches don't crash and burn, churches don't sink, leaders don't fall that way, if they are rooted in God's word day after day, and people don't crash and burn like that. If they know and live God's word, by the grace of God, they will not just survive, they'll thrive. Isaiah 40, verse 8 says that the word of our God endures forever. Isaiah also prophesied, woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, in Isaiah 5 21. In other words, hey, don't be wise in your own eyes. We don't need our opinion. We don't need business leaders. We don't need your axioms. We need God's word. Jeremiah 9, 23 to 24, Jeremiah declared that a man should not boast in his own wisdom, but he should know God. Truthfully, who cares what I know? Who cares what you know? All that matters is who we know, and that is our God. Paul called the wisdom of this world foolishness in 1 Corinthians 3 19, Matthew 7.26, Jesus said those who hear his words and don't do them are on sinking sand. You're just building a beach house right where the waves are crashing. But when you build your life on God's word, you are building on a rock. It's the best idea you could ever have to go with scripture when it comes to pouring the spiritual foundation of wisdom in your life. In fact, it's the only idea that you and I should ever have when it comes to building our life. We build our life on Christ and in that his word. Many Christians are at different places when it comes to biblical knowledge, but every Christian is supposed to be enjoying the same process when it comes to Bible knowledge progression. Nobody is going to get it right every time. Nobody's going to nail it every day. You're going to have seasons where you feel spiritually dry, and you're going to have days where you didn't interact with God's word as much as you would like to, but every Christian is called to continuous growth in handling God's word. It was the psalmist who declared in Psalm 119 105, Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. So you don't have to live under the cover of darkness. You don't have to be a casualty. You don't have to be pray for spiritual predators. Pick up your Bible and let the light of God's word pour in. I want to recommend some resources to you. First, the book How to Eat Your Bible by Nate Pikkowitz, a wonderful dear brother of mine. I love him tremendously. He's so faithful, and he wrote this book recently. People have been devouring it, literally, no pun intended. It's called How to Eat Your Bible. It's a blue book. It's on Amazon. It's short, it's sweet, it's to the point. You will be so blessed by it. Another book, How to Study God's Word, by John MacArthur. A book that helped me in my early days of conversion get a handle on studying God's Word. And another book that did something similar for me, Searching the Scriptures by Chuck Swindahl. Searching the Scriptures by Chuck Swindall. Tremendous book as well. And finally, The Origin of the Bible. If you're one of those people that says, hey, I want to know the Bible more, but I want to know the origins of it. The Origin of the Bible by FF Bruce, J.I. Packer, Philip Comfort, and Carl Henry, a great book as well. If you have those in your library, you are going to be in great shape as you start the journey or strengthen your journey in knowing God's Word. My prayers this episode did what we wanted it to do, which is shake you up, wake you up, and stir you up to go to God's Word and depend on God's Word and get a handle on God's Word. I want to thank you all for being with us today on the For the Gospel podcast. For free video teachings, go to our YouTube channel to give or read more articles or check out more videos or to find out more about our dating conference that's going to be this September 24th and 25th. Go to for thegospel.org. And don't forget we're on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. And we will be back next Monday with another episode right here on the For the Gospel podcast. So for now, keep on living for the gospel.