Joints

Have you ever realized that you got something wrong in your understanding of the Bible?  I have.  I have in the past few months.  One of the realities we face in Bible study is that anytime we approach a text we come with a preconceived notion of what we will see.  (I have written about this several times, this post was the first.)  It is one of the struggles in Bible study to look past what we expect to see and allow the text, the prime data, speak to us.

Tuesday mornings I am in a study with men whom I have known for over 40 years.  We were in Ephesians a few months back.  We are following the same pattern we follow in each book or topic we study.  We do an overview of the book or topic, study the details or sections, and then summarize what we have seen.  We move from the whole to the parts and then back to the whole.

During the study, we invested about 4 weeks in Ephesians 4 (here @ BibleGateway).  I have used Ephesians 4:11 – 16 (here @ BibleGateway) to validate the need for communities of faith to intentionally engage in equipping each of their members for years.  While that is true, in the process of focusing on the need to be intentional to equip each person in the fellowship, I missed something vitally important.

Consider Ephesians 4:14 – 16 (here @ BibleGateway).  Read through it yourself and notice what is repeated and how Paul describes the purpose of the gifts, what they are supposed to do, and what should be the outcome of the successful deployment of the gifts in a body.  If you have time write down your observations and compare them to what I am going to share tomorrow.