Sweeter Than Honey: Enjoying God in His WordSample

Gather Knowledge

It’s easy to swing between two extremes when we read our Bibles—simply opening to any page and expecting it to speak directly to our lives without making an effort to understand the meaning of the passage, or looking to a rigorous process of Bible study to make sure we do it just right. If you tend to open your Bible just to search for the nearest answer to a problem in your life, you might sense that you’re missing something, some bigger picture.

This study will help you dig into God’s Word, understand it, and apply it by learning three key principles of Bible study: gather knowledge, digest the big ideas, and grow in godliness. These principles will help you faithfully interpret Scripture while adapting the exact process to your personality, your season of life, the book of the Bible you’re studying, and even your study goals.

The first principle of Bible study is to gather knowledge. Like a forager bee gathering nectar from flowers to produce honey, we must diligently search God’s Word to gather the knowledge that will be digested into understanding. This is more than speed-reading the pages of your Bible. This is slowing down, seeking to understand, and gathering only what already exists. In the same way that you might start a new relationship by asking intentional questions about a person’s past, preferences, and personality, gathering knowledge through careful attention to God’s Word deepens your relationship with him.

Gathering knowledge looks like thoughtfully reading the text and asking yourself, What does this passage say? It’s easy to assume you know what the Bible says based on previous readings, sermons or podcasts you’ve listened to, or what that wise woman said on social media, but this principle asks you to leave behind what you think these verses mean and only gather what is actually presented.

Gathering knowledge is a commitment to considering the context of the passage. How would the original hearers of the passage have understood it as they listened to it, recited it, and sung it in their own context? How have generations of believers understood it since then based on the story of Scripture, the historical context, and the genre and literary style? While it’s tempting to speed through this to get to the big ideas and applications, gathering knowledge about the text is actually the most time-consuming portion of studying God’s Word. Like a bee’s relentless pursuit of nectar, studying the Bible diligently takes discipline, but over time, it produces a delight that’s sweeter than honey.