Great Bible Truths Podcast Episode 124
The Promises of God Talk 5
Principles for interpreting God’s promises
In Part One of this series of talks, which we entitled Identifying God’s promises, we saw that:
- God’s promises are fulfilled in Christ
- God’s promises are fulfilled in the gospel
- God’s promises are fulfilled in our salvation
We also identified six aspects of our salvation that the New Testament describes as promises:
- We are made righteous by faith in our Lord Jesus Christ
- We are God’s children
- We will rise from the dead
- We have eternal life
- We have a glorious inheritance awaiting us
- We have a foretaste of our inheritance in the gift of the Holy Spirit.
We also saw that not every verse in the Bible is a promise and that it’s important to distinguish between promises, statements and commands. We discussed what we can learn from promises God made to others even if they’re not made directly to us. We concluded by considering how we can identify promises that are not actually described as promises in the New Testament (i.e. verses that do not contain the word ‘promise’).
Now in Part Two, which I have entitled Understanding God’s promises, we will be looking in greater detail at the promises we identified in Part One so that we can understand them better, along with other aspects of our salvation that we might well regard as promises (e.g. healing). But first, in this talk, I would like us to consider why it’s important to understand them correctly before explaining how to do so.
Why it’s important to understand God’s promises correctly
Now at first sight the answer to this question seems to be obvious. If God says anything it must clearly be important that we understand what he is saying. But sadly we know from experience that many Christians do misunderstand some of God’s promises and this can lead to:
- False hope
- Unwise behaviour
- Misguided practice.
False hope
Clearly if we misunderstand what God is saying and expect God to do something for us because we believe that he has promised it, this likely to lead to frustration and disappointment. A common example of this is when people misunderstand God’s promises with regard to answers to prayer.
For example, it’s all too easy to read verses like John 15:7 where Jesus says, Ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you, without paying attention to the condition attached to it: If you abide in me, and my words abide in you…
In our last talk we saw the importance of examining the context in which a verse (or part of a verse) is set, and later in this talk we’ll be considering why we need to compare scripture with scripture. With regard to the verse we’ve just used as an illustration, it’s failure to do both these things that leads to a misunderstanding of what Jesus meant and an unrealistic expectation of how God will answer our prayers.
Unwise behaviour
Another result of misunderstanding God’s promises is unwise behaviour. For example, if we don’t understand God’s promises of healing correctly, we might decide to refuse medical treatment. This is particularly likely if we’ve been persuaded that Jesus died for our sicknesses in exactly the same way that he died for our sins. The only logical outcome of this doctrine is that the use of medical means is at best unnecessary and at worst a lack of faith. I will be devoting a whole talk to healing later in the series. For the present, I am just using it as a clear example of unwise behaviour resulting from a misunderstanding of God’s promises. Meanwhile please see my PhD thesis or my book Just a Taste of Heaven for a rejection of this doctrine.
Misguided practice
Closely connected with unwise behaviour is misguided practice. Continuing with the theme of healing by way of illustration, one example of misguided practice would be the insistence by some that when ministering to the sick we should always command healing rather than pray for it.
Now there are undoubtedly occasions when it’s right to command healing, as Peter did in Acts 3, but we should only do so when clearly led by the Holy Spirit. Even Jesus did nothing except what God first showed him (John 5:19) and commanding a healing without the leading of the Spirit will not glorify God and dishonour the name of Jesus.
And telling people that they are healed when clearly they are not can lead to disastrous consequences, as in the case of Wesley Parker whose parents sadly let their son die by withholding the medication he needed in the misguided belief that he was healed.
So misunderstanding God’s promises can lead to false hope, unwise behaviour, and misguided practice, all of which can have serious consequences. But there is, of course, absolutely no need to misunderstand them if we will only follow a few basic guidelines.
How to understand God’s promises correctly
In this section I’m going to suggest five keys to understanding God’s promises correctly:
- Examining the context
- Interpreting OT promises in the light of the NT
- Distinguishing between the literal and the figurative
- Comparing scripture with scripture
- Asking for the help of the Holy Spirit
Examining the context
This is so important that I’m going to repeat what I said in our last talk. Examining the context means looking at the surrounding verses to see if they shed light on what the verse means. It may sometimes be necessary to look at the book as a whole, then the surrounding chapters before considering the verses in the immediate context. This isn’t always necessary, but if we do take the trouble to do this, we’re more likely to arrive at a correct understanding of what the verse is saying.
Then, having looked at the wider context, as we come to consider the immediate context, it may be helpful to ask questions like:
Who said it? To whom? When and where was it said? And why?
Other helpful questions to ask would be:
Does this passage apply to everyone?
Does this passage apply to all Christians?
Interpreting OT promises in the light of the NT
As we mentioned in earlier talks, Hebrews 1:1-2 shows us that, although God formerly spoke through the OT prophets, his final revelation to us is in his Son. Indeed all the promises he made through the prophets find their fulfilment in Christ. And it’s in the New Testament that we find clearly explained the meaning of OT promises about him.
For example, in Isaiah 53:4 we read:
Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering… (NIV).
This has often been used to support the doctrine I was talking about earlier – that on the cross Jesus carried our sicknesses as well as our sins. It’s an attractive idea that at first sight might easily appear to be correct. But was Isaiah really saying that Jesus would bear our suffering on the cross? The question is settled when we look at the New Testament where the verse is quoted only once. Matthew 8:16-17 says:
- When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all who were ill.
- This was to fulfil what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah: ‘He took up our infirmities and bore our diseases.’ (NIV).
Here the NT makes it clear that this part of Isaiah 53 was fulfilled by Jesus healing the sick early in his ministry years before he was crucified. Nowhere does it say that Jesus carried our sicknesses on the cross. But that leads us to the next important key to understanding God’s promises correctly – distinguishing between the literal and the figurative.
Distinguishing between the literal and the figurative
Still continuing with the theme of healing as an illustration of how to understand God’s promises correctly, we need to discern whether a word is being used literally or metaphorically. A classic example of this is where Peter says:
He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed (1 Peter 2:24).
The last part of this verse is often used to support the view that Jesus carried our sicknesses on the cross. But the context makes it clear that Peter is using the word ‘heal’ metaphorically. The first part of the verse is talking about Jesus bearing our SINS on the cross and the next verse goes on to say:
For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.
Note the little word ‘for’. It connects v25 to v24. By his wounds you have been healed FOR you were like straying sheep but now you have returned to the Shepherd… This clearly connects the word ‘healed’ to the conversion of his readers. They were ‘healed’ from the wounds of sin when they returned to the Shepherd.
Comparing scripture with scripture
We have already said quite a lot about the importance of reading Bible verses in their context. We talked about the immediate context and then the wider context of the book. But there is an even wider context to consider – the Bible as a whole.
If we believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God then it follows that there will be a consistent message throughout. It’s important, therefore, to compare the scripture we are looking at with other scriptures in order to see whether the way we may want to interpret the verse is in line with the overall teaching of the Bible. If it does not, then it follows that we are possibly misunderstanding exactly what the promise means.
For example, in Ephesians 5:18 Paul tells us to be filled with the Spirit. His readers clearly understood what he meant by this, so in the immediate context Paul didn’t need to explain what he meant. But in the book of Acts we are given very clear descriptions of people being filled with the Spirit, and so by comparing scripture with scripture we gain a clearer insight into what it means. In fact the narrative passages of the NT (the Gospels and Acts) will often help us understand the terminology that’s used in the epistles.
So comparing scripture with scripture is an important way of making sure we’re correctly understanding what the Bible is saying. Now obviously, the better understanding you have of the overall teaching of the Bible, the easier it will be for you to do this. So the more you read the Bible the greater your understanding will become, but, if you feel that you might need some help in this area, may I recommend my book, You’d Better Believe It, which I wrote to help people get to know the Bible better. It’s available from my website www.davidpetts.org. There are 20 easy to read chapters with questions at the end of each chapter which will help you check that you’ve understood what I’ve written.
Asking for the help of the Holy Spirit
And last, but by no means least, if we want to understand the Bible correctly, it’s a good idea to ask the Author what it means. In John 16:13 Jesus promised his disciples that the Holy Spirit would guide them into all the truth. For some of them that would include the help of the Spirit as later ther wrote the books of the New Testament. And if they needed the Spirit’s help to write it, how much more do we need his help as we read it?
So, to summarise, our five keys to understanding the Bible correctly are:
- Examine the context
- Interpret OT promises in the light of the NT
- Distinguish between the literal and the figurative
- Compare scripture with scripture
- Ask for the help of the Holy Spirit