GCV Blog

Grace Church of the Valley blog.

Fundamentals

by Pastor David

As Pastor Scott began the book of Jonah last week, one of the issues he covered was the debate about Jonah being a literal, historical book. That topic made me think of how essential our fundamental, basic convictions about the Bible are. One of God’s blessings through kids is the reminder of how much we assume. For instance, before our kids were born I was under the mistaken impression that babies are born with some basic understandings. Turns out that not only are children born without basic communication abilities, hand-eye coordination, or motor skills, there’s even a learning curve on how to eat. To eat! Pretty hard to get more basic than that.

At this point, I have eating, walking, and talking in the “basic” category, and don’t tend to think too much about doing them. Still, those basics touch every part of my every day. Similarly, I’m concerned that too often we place Scripture into that “basic” category—we don’t think about how much it touches and we can forget how central it is.

“Reading your Bible” and “preaching” are at the basics level of Christianity. However, we must constantly remind ourselves why that’s so and recommit ourselves to doing the basics well. That’s exactly what Paul was after when he wrote to Timothy in 2 Timothy 3. Timothy had followed Paul’s teaching, lifestyle, suffering, and motivations, but Paul still wanted to remind him about those things (vv. 10-12). He also exhorted Timothy to continue in what he had learned and firmly believed (vv. 14-15). From his childhood, Timothy had been acquainted with the sacred writings. That Scripture was able to make Timothy wise unto salvation, which is why he needed to continue in them all his life. Scripture saves.

Are you far down the path in your Christian life? Remember that you must continue in Scripture because it is what saves. Do you have children in your care? Recall that Timothy was acquainted with the sacred writings because a godly grandma and mom acquainted him with them. Depend on Scripture to save your loved ones. Depend on it by speaking it, explaining it, and continuing in it yourselves. Basic? Sure. But only Scripture is able to make us wise for salvation.