Paint by number kits were fun as a kid. They give one the sense of being artistic when really, one doesn't have to have much talent at all. One only needs to be able to count. Like most kids, one time I impulsively dug into the paint by number kit I just got as a birthday present. I wanted so badly to see this finished masterpiece that "I" created that I did not pay close attention to the numbers on the paint board. I remember thinking, well this little spot here was green so the area right next to it has to be light brown. By the time I was finished, the image that was supposed to depict a lion sitting in some tall grass looked more like a toasted marshmallow.
I had done two things wrong. First, I had not paid careful attention to the clear instructions provided and secondly I had put my own interpretation upon the image in progress. You can see where I'm going with this now. How many of us do this with scripture?
To use the paint by number analogy again, when it comes to bible study, we are all given a fresh "paint board" with clearly marked numbers (chapter and verse) as well as paints and a paint brush. Few of us start in the same place but our goal is most often the same and by the time we stand before our Maker, we should all have a complete painting that looks the same right? Why then doesn't it seem that way now?
I wonder if many of us make the same mistakes I did with the lion painting. Are we perhaps a bit to quick to try to finish the picture in our minds that we put the numbers (verses) together incorrectly and begin to paint a distorted picture? Take 12 bible students and ask them what is meant by John 2:10 ~ [And he said to him, “Every man at the beginning sets out the good wine, and when the guests have well drunk, then the inferior. You have kept the good wine until now!”] (NKJV) ~ and you will probably get 5-10 different interpretations. Does this passage condone drinking wine? Does it mean that new believers tend to fizzle out and fall into melancholy? Does it point to the perfection of Christ? Does it say something completely different than any of these?
The point is, depending on how we interpret that verse will tend to cause us to thread it together with a different set of verses to support a doctrinal stance that either we want to believe or simply develops because of the order in which we study scripture. I've found this many times in my own study. As I read and re-read the Word of God, more and more pictures begin to emerge but not always clearly. When I read in Zechariah 12 about the nations coming against Jerusalem, I remember that it says something similar in Revelation 16 and in Zechariah 14 and so the three begin to form a picture of the last days, but wait! Did I forget about Psalm 79:1? Does that verse even apply here? If I believe it does then the overall picture I am painting will look different from someone else's.
Even as you read this, many are already forming arguments in their minds. Some might be saying, "Of course Psalm 79:1 doesn't fit there and you forgot about Joel 3:12" That is the message I'm trying to share. The way that we each thread and various truths in scripture together, combined with the interpretations we adopt along the way can heavily influence the picture we end up with. Who am I to say that my painting of a toasted marshmallow lion is the correct one and certainly has to be better than your painting of a hedge hog in a basket. After all I've been painting for decades so I must have the right vision.
Sounds silly doesn't it? Why then do so many of us argue over the correct interpretation of scripture with such determination? There is an extremely high likelihood that each one of us will need correction when we stand before Yeshua. Why don't we share and discuss our understanding of scripture with each other with that judgement seat in mind? If we can do this, then much strife and stress will be avoided and perhaps the rebuke we face at the judgement seat of Christ might be lessened.
Shalom
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