Deep DiscipleshipSample

A Disciple Grows in the Knowledge of the Bible

When I was a kid growing up in school, I learned all about the food pyramid. If you’re a lot younger than me, this may be a foreign concept to you, so let me break it down. It’s a pyramid with four levels, meant to communicate how much of different types of food we should eat each day. On the bottom level is grains—bread, potatoes, cereal. According to the food pyramid, this was supposed to make up 40 percent of our daily intake! Above that is fruits and veggies (35 percent), then meat and dairy (20 percent), then fats, oils, and sweets (5 percent). 

Of course, the food pyramid is pretty outdated now. There’s a reason it’s not still being taught in physical education classes. Nonetheless, the idea was simple: it sought to show the non-negotiables of a healthy diet. What is essential to a healthy life? 

We could ask the same question. What is essential to deep discipleship? That’s exactly the question we’ll be answering over the course of the next three days, and the first answer is the Bible. A deep disciple must grow in his or her knowledge of the Christian Scriptures.

The Bible must be at the center of the Christian life. It is God’s Word: authoritative, inerrant, and sufficient for growing as a healthy disciple of Christ. Scripture is God’s ordained means of revealing and giving himself to us. Simply put, it is impossible to be a follower of Christ without being a student of his Word.

The apostle Paul, encouraging his young mentee Timothy, highlighted the centrality of Scripture for the Christian life: “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16–17). 

The claim that the Bible is the breath of God means there is no substitute for Scripture in growing holistic disciples. The Bible is God’s revelation of himself and his ongoing self-giving. In other words, Scripture is where God has made himself known, and it is where he continues to make himself known.

If you don’t hear another word I say, hear this: there is no substitute for the Word of God. If I could convince you to do one thing for the long-term health of your spiritual life, it would be to read the Bible every single day. Read big chunks and little snippets. Skim large sections for context and meditate on small sections for depth. Memorize it. Talk about it. Dive in. It doesn’t matter what else you do; if you’re not a committed learner of God’s Word, you won’t be a deep disciple.