MAKING THE WORD REAL WHEN YOU READ IT!

How to Make the Word Practical

Each of us need help developing the discipline of daily Bible study.  Most people have a set time for Devotion in the morning, before starting their day, to help guide them through their day. 

These are:

1. Questions that you need to ask while studying the Word. 

2.  Steps to interpret the scriptures and apply them to your daily life.

Devotional Study Guide

I.   Observation

Look for significant features. What’s the background of the incident? Who is involved? What are the relationships between people? What is happening? Why are particular choices made or actions taken?

II.  Interpretation

Why did these events happen? What are the cause-effect relationships? What were the results? What does this passage reveal about God and His ways? What is the primary message of the passage?

III. Application

How am I like the people here? What experiences of mine are parallel? When do I have similar feelings, face similar situations? How can I profit from or be guided by what is recorded?

Look at how these scriptures can be approached devotionally.

Esau’s hunger (Gen. 25:29–34). Esau was the oldest son of Isaac and, according to law and custom, was in line to inherit a double portion of Isaac’s possessions, including the covenant promise of God. This was his birthright: his right by birth.

But one day after a hunting trip Esau came home hungry. Jacob was boiling a stew of lentils, and Esau asked for some. Seeing his chance, and knowing his brother well, Jacob demanded Esau’s birthright in return. The Bible tells us that Esau “despised” his birthright and swore it to Jacob as the price of the pottage.

What a picture! Esau weighed the promise of God’s continual presence and blessing against a bowl of soup—and valued the soup more highly. What a revelation of Esau’s character. He was a man who valued the present rather than the future, the material rather than the invisible. The momentary satisfaction of physical desires seemed more important to him than the approval of God. The body, not the spirit, dominated his scale of values.

I can look at Esau’s act and be amazed by it. But what I need to realize is that this act of selling the birthright was an action that is in character, not out of character. It was the result of a long process of character formation, a long history of choice after choice which shaped Esau’s personality.

Right now I may look at Esau with wonder and say, “I’d never do that.” Instead I ought to look at the action as an expression of character, and wonder: In what direction are my daily choices leading me? Do I so value my present experiences that I fail to discipline myself to wait when waiting is best? Do I have to have the pleasures of eating despite the fact that I’m overweight? Is God high enough on my priority list to cause me to spend time with Him, or do other things push Him out of my thoughts?

I can shake my head in wonder at Esau, but I had better realize that unless I make a daily habit of rejecting Esau’s values, I might someday be faced with a similar choice—and make the wrong one!

  

Adapted from:  “The Teachers Commentary”

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