A GOOD HISTORICAL BIBLE COMMENTARY WILL HELP PROTECT YOU FROM BEING DECEIVED BY MODERN DOCTRINAL MANIPULATION

Ever notice how when you're watching a movie or reading a book and someone comes across a genie in a bottle, it rarely ends well? On the surface, being granted 3 wishes would seem to be the ultimate stroke of luck. Like many things in life though, things often aren't what they appear to be at first glance. The primary problem always seems to be the arrival of unintended and unforeseen consequences, which stem from the wishes. Our problem is that, unlike God, we aren't omniscient and equipped to wield such massive power.

In the same vein as the genie scenario, in our youth, most of us were absolutely certain that we knew exactly what we wanted. Mom and Dad's input often fell on deaf ears, since we probably considered them old and out of touch. Consider the horrors of God granting us everything we asked for as a 10-year -old child. Though we thought we knew everything, in reality, we knew very little. All you have to do is go back and consider how rapidly and drastically your life's priorities changed as you matured. What a blessing that God didn't let allow our young, naive minds to make life-altering decisions we were nowhere near mature enough to comprehend!

In much the same way, we as adults often behave like that 10-year-old child when it comes to evaluating doctrine. Anyone who has ever opened a bible knows that you can make it say anything you want, just by cherry-picking isolated verses. It can sometimes come down to the meaning of a word like 'all', and the context in which it is used: does it mean every single person? Or does it mean all types of people? When asked by a friend about attendance at an event, we may casually say: 'everyone was there', but yet we obviously don't technically mean that everyone on the planet was in attendance. This is why I believe it is so important to not immediately arrive at conclusions, solely based on isolated words or verses.

It is much better to evaluate what the bible as a whole says about a given subject, and then view the individual verses through that lens. This method of allowing the bible to interpret itself is collectively known as Systematic Theology. There is one big problem with this method: though we should, most of us don't have the motivation (and in fairness, the mental ability,) to spend an entire lifetime connecting the vast number of dots from Genesis to Revelation.

Reading through the bible the way you would a regular book certainly has its place, but seeing how the 66 books, written by 40 authors, on 3 different continents, in 3 different languages, over more than 1,500 years, tie together so seamlessly is what will absolutely blow your mind. There are few things more faith affirming! In fact, I've read biographies by multiple atheists (they tend to be analytical types like lawyers, detectives, etc.) who set out to disprove the existence of God by refuting the bible. Instead of accomplishing their objective, these people came out the other side of the tunnel as Christians. It's amazing how people will flippantly dismiss the bible as a bunch of forged writings by random monks from the dark ages, when nothing could be further from the truth. We have far more manuscripts for the bible (tens-of-thousands,) than we do for any other ancient writing.

Since knowing how any given verse reflects others, and is reflected by others, is how we can see the forest, rather than just trees, biblically speaking. This is imperative, but since most of us are ill-equipped for such a monumental task, we will likely require some assistance from some reliable historic sources. And to clarify: when I say a commentary, I am not talking about someone merely giving his own opinion on what a given bible verse means. A good commentary is one which primarily allows us to see how the tens-of-thousands of verses from Genesis to Revelation make references to one another. Secondarily, the author will then do his best to form a conclusion on that data. I want to share a few of my favorites with you:

At the top of the list, I'd have to put the Matthew Henry's Bible Commentary. It was written in 1706 and comes in both a concise single edition, and a more thorough 6-volume set. If I could only own one commentary, his would be the one. Here are a few others which I own and love: John Gill (1746); Keil and Delitzsch (1866); Jamieson, Fausset and Brown (1871). I am not saying that you take the interpretations of any of these men and blindly accept his conclusion on how the bible interprets itself on a given topic. And these men wouldn't recommend that either, as they would all be far too wise and in awe of God and His Word, to foolishly promote their own inerrancy. 

And while I'm at it, one of the very best software programs for the layperson to quickly and efficiently study and evaluate scripture is one called e-Sword. I've used it for probably twenty-years or more and love it. You can select most, if not all of the commentaries I mentioned above, along with dozens of bible resources (bible dictionaries, concordances, etc.,) and quickly determine the historical context of any bible word or verse. I don't receive anything to promote this software, as it's a free program. I'm pretty sure the commentaries I mentioned above are all free, though you are also given the option to purchase a license for some of the more modern commercial resources, if you wish. But that is certainly not necessary to benefit massively from the free older resources (which are my favorites, anyway). 

By adopting this method, one of the big advantages you will have is when one of the many modern Johnny-come-latelys out there come along and swiftly substitutes his own flavor-of-the-week doctrinal interpretations, for those which have been around historically for thousands-of-years. Older resources which have stood the test of time, are almost always my preferred sources. Hopefully, if nothing else, the next time you hear someone utter the words 'here's what the bible really meant', you'll have some solid resources to assist you in determining if that's so, just like the Bereans:

Act 17:10  And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. Act 17:11  These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.