At our START meeting on Tuesday night I circulated an article that explained and promoted “The Swedish Method” of Bible Study which is the foundation of the lesser known “Norwegian Method” đ we’ve been using for the last year or so at SCPC.
Among other things, the article explains that the main goal of this kind of study, in which we ask the same questions no matter what the passage, is to let the Bible speak for itself and thereby encourage growth and confidence in personal Bible reading habits.
I personally found it a great article for being reminded of how to make the most of the method – especially about not jumping in with my own ideas of what the passage says too quickly! It also includes some encouraging stories like this one…
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âWho could I tell?â This is a great question, and is not part of the original Swedish Bible Method. I learnt it from an Indian man (in Cambodia) who was previously involved in the Peace and Reconciliation movement in India that followed the burning of Graham Staines and his two sons in their car by Hindu extremists. He told me of the huge impact that this question has had in church planting in northern India. The first time I used this question was at a conference, with a group of overseas students. The Japanese girls in the group, who were out telling their friends what they had discovered from the first day, became Christians by the end of the week.Imagine their concept of the normal Christian life: it has to do with telling people about what they were reading in the Bible. If we all were doing that, we would hardly need to train anyone in personal evangelism or disciple-making: we would all be doing it!
Itâs so simple: tell someone what weâve learned or discovered from our Bible reading. Once we get into the hang of it, weâll find it easier. Weâll find more creative ways, and a wider range of people to talk to, simply through practice. Natural, conversational evangelism and discipleshipâstraight from Godâs word.
If you weren’t at the START meeting and would like to read the whole article (5 pages) you can find it HERE (the article starts on page 52 of the PDF). As an encouragement to have a read, here’s a text that one SCPC member sent me on Wednesday morning…
…Thank you so much for the article on Bible reading – so good…
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