The World of God’s Word

Loading Scripture… Acts 16:6–8 (ESV)

Now we move into what is an often-neglected part of Bible study – the cultural and geographic settings in which much of Scripture is based.

What is it and why does it matter?

Be honest. Do your eyes ever glaze over when you are reading your Bible and you come to passages like the one above? I can honestly say that in my mind, verses like this often sound like “Blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. So, blah blah blah blah.” Most of us have little to no context of the region in which Paul and Timothy were journeying. So, the locales just become a jumble of noise. Blah is just as good as Mysia, because we know nothing about either one.

But would we enjoy Scripture more if we had a basic understanding of the geography? Does it help at all to know that they are traveling through what is today northwestern Turkey? And that the Holy Spirit’s redirect places them in Troas, a port city with easy access to Macedonia – what is now modern day Europe – and specifically, Greece? The Holy Spirit is setting the stage for the first missionary venture into Europe – The Macedonian Call as it is commonly known and of which we read in Acts 16:9-10: And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing there, urging him and saying, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." And when Paul had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.

That context takes the passage from bland to fascinating. From blah, blah, blah to the visual manifestation of God fulfilling the New Covenant and the Gospel bearing fruit across the whole world. Paul’s missionary journeys are much more exciting and inviting when you can ascertain your surroundings.

Similarly, what if you encounter a passage like this from Mark 7:26-27? “Now the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. And he said to her, ‘Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.’” A surface reading of the text may seem highly offensive – did Jesus just insult that lady? Context, culture, and a theological understanding of the use of the terms “children” and “dogs” would go a long way toward demonstrating an insult is not in view but a call to the woman’s humility and faith. So a surface reading brings nothing but confusion and studying the underlying context brings compassion for the woman and warmth towards her Savior.

What should I seek to understand about the topic?

• There are a lot of “ites” in the Old Testament: Amorites, Hittites, Ammonites, Moabites, and others. Who were these neighbors of Israel and how do they affect the biblical narrative?
• Assyria conquered the Northern Kingdom of Israel, and Babylon conquered Judah. Learning something of the history of these nations will make the Bible more interesting and easier to understand.
• What is the geography of Israel and its neighbors? How were the Roman provinces in and around Israel arranged at the time of Christ?
• What happened to Israel politically during the intertestamental period – that is, the roughly 400 years between the writing of Malachi and the birth of Christ?
• How did Greek and Roman culture influence the writing of the New Testament and the spread of the gospel?
• Tracing the missionary journeys of Paul on a map will help you understand how the Gospel spread from Jerusalem, to all of Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. (Acts 1:8)

My thoughts on the topic

I believe my opening statement in this section is supported by the truth of this chapter: Don’t read your Bible. Know your Bible. And you can’t really know your Bible without the aid of a teacher. Returning briefly to Ephesians 4:11-12, we read “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ.” Does the absence of the Bible from that list suggest it is NOT given to accomplish those things? Not at all. But it does confirm that you and your Bible alone, apart from the church and its teachers and great cloud of witnesses, are not to be your only means of understanding truth. On the contrary, most heresies arise from gleaning meaning from a passage in isolation from the church, its history, pastoral counsel, and interaction with fellow believers. Surface reading and proof-texting often lead to interpretations that the whole counsel of God clearly contradicts. God has given us tools to help understand context. Take advantage of those tools.

Geography and cultural ignorance don’t necessarily result in a bad interpretation of Scripture. But having familiarity with the lives of the typical shepherd will give you insight into the meaning of what is said about the Good Shepherd. And understanding the political landscape at the time of Christ will make all the more interesting his flight as a baby to Egypt in order – according to Scripture – to fulfil the prophecy of Hosea 11:1: “out of Egypt, I called my son.” It’s almost as if God’s providential governance of all things set the stage for things to come to pass exactly as he decreed they would.

We’re getting close to actually reading the Bible. Let’s keep going with Chapter 4: The Interpretation of God’s Word.