Every generation of Christians faces the very same challenge: To learn the Bible for themselves and to teach it to those who follow in their footsteps. This task cannot be willed, it cannot be inherited, it cannot be passed down. Rather, each generation must accept afresh the challenge to honor, to know, and to obey the Word of God.

Gary Millar’s Read This First is, according to the subtitle, “A Simple Guide to Getting the Most from the Bible.” It is, in that way, a wonderful place to begin for those who wish to accept their God-given responsibility (or alternatively, a wonderful resource to distribute to help others with theirs).
Millar says, “This book aims to help people who would like to read the Bible but don’t really know where to start or how to go about it. You may be a Christian who enjoys being part of a church or a Bible-study group, but you end up feeling lost and confused whenever you attempt to read the Bible for yourself. You may have even tried to embark on a Bible-reading regime but … it didn’t take long before you gave up with a sense of defeat: you just don’t get it. That’s why I’ve written this book: to guide you through it. My hope is that you’ll read this first and go back to the Bible with the skills and confidence to truly enjoy it.”
There is a second audience in his mind: “You may be pretty new to Christianity. You have always thought that the Bible seems interesting enough for you to take a look, but you’ve been put off by the small print, strange ‘religious’ language, its distance from your culture, or even just its size. You may have been been encouraged to read the Bible by a friend, or heard a snippet of what it says at a wedding or funeral, or come across a quotation somewhere. It’s often said that the Bible is one of the best-selling books of all time. That alone seems like a good reason to dip into it.”
For either of those audiences, or even more experienced Bible-readers who are just looking for a bit of a refresh, Read This First offers a simple, helpful guide to reading the Bible well. It begins with an explanation of why everyone should consider reading the Bible, then begins to teach how to read it: to pay attention to the “vibe” of any passage, to discern meaning, to account for context, and to read it both as a book that was written in a different time and to a different audience and as a book that was written for we who live here and now.
Though Read This First is short and simple, that is exactly its purpose and its exactly its charm. It is just the kind of book each of us would have benefitted to read at the start of our journey to better understand God’s Word and just the kind of resource each of us loves to distribute to others. It will do exactly what it promises: help those who have a desire to read the Bible to actually read the Bible—and to read it right. I’m very glad to recommend it.

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Today’s post is sponsored by BJU Seminary and written by Bruce Meyer, biblical counseling faculty member. BJU Seminary equips Christian leaders through an educational and ministry experience that is biblically shaped, theologically rich, historically significant, and evangelistically robust.

What do we do with dark despair?
If you know anything about depression, you know that its seems to be a ubiquitous problem but also a controversial subject. How could it be that we misunderstand such a common problem? Because in this world, there are many common problems for which we have little understanding. Left to ourselves, we often interpret situations through a lens that is at best fuzzy and at worst extremely fractured. So what should we make of such a common problem that causes such severe grief in so many?
As we always should, let’s begin with what the Scriptures say about depression. Depending upon what translation a person uses, the word depression may not even appear in the Bible. Other words like sadness, despair, or grief, however, certainly establish that this emotion transcends time as much as the fallen human condition. Biblical authors, therefore, were neither ignorant of nor immune to heavy sadness that humans experience in daily living. Whatever term one chooses to use, there are countless passages that address this aspect of our fallenness. Even the Messiah was “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (Isa. 53:3). We can trace these episodes of sorrow backwards to the Fall in Genesis 3, the beginning of all sorrows.
It should be an axiom of life that both the horrors of hell and the joys of heaven sometimes leak into this world in varying degrees. We long, however, for more joys and fewer horrors, a longing that keeps nudging our eyes toward our Father and heaven. How should we respond when we, as children of God, experience some of those horrors? Has God left us without hope, without solutions, without answers? As prevalent as sadness is in the Scriptures, so are God’s words of hope, beginning right after the Fall with a promised deliverer (Gen. 3:15). We should know also that our grief is merely a symptom of living in a broken world, but God’s hope overrules all despair. Hope in God is the operative concept.
God has provided His children with focused truth that gives comforting direction in moments of depression and despair. Lament psalms constitute the largest portion of the psalter—59 in all. These laments are complaints about the psalmists’ circumstances, including complaints about God’s seeming inattentiveness. Psalm 88 is the darkest of the laments, yet it offers the hope of deliverance through a God who saves: “O LORD, God of my salvation; I cry out day and night before you” (v. 1). Although the hope in this psalm is brief in contrast to the complaints, the psalmist is still expectantly engaging with God through his pleas for deliverance (v. 2). Did you see the hope again?
The most directly applicable psalms to despairing sadness are Psalms 42 and 43. The two psalms are linked through the common question, “Why are you cast down, O my soul?” (42:5) that the psalmist sprinkles throughout both passages. In each psalm the author not only describes his heavy sorrows, but also preaches hope to his own soul through the nature and work of God. There it is again—hope!
If none of these psalms provide the salve your heavy heart needs, then dig into the other 56 laments. These laments will direct your heart to the Savior-God who rescues us not only from sin, but from the shattering despair we encounter in this life. As we walk with him, we can experience a living hope in our living God that sooths the aching soul.
Join BJU Seminary January 29–31 for its CoRE Conference on “The Return of Hope: Dealing with Depression in the Church.” Save with the early bird discount until December 15!

Like most major airports, Toronto’s Pearson International divides the arrivals area from the departures so that one is a level above the other. I have passed through both of them hundreds of times and have made this observation: The upper level is a place of sorrow while the lower level is a place of celebration. The upstairs departures area is distinguished by family members weeping and saying farewell, the downstairs arrivals area by family members waving and hugging and crying out their welcomes.

Families often immigrate to Canada in stages. The first family members are often young and single, drawn to Canada by its universities or entry-level jobs. After a few years they journey back to their homelands and return with a spouse to begin a family of their own. Over time their siblings make the journey, then their parents and even grandparents as the families gain the means and ability to sponsor them. One-by-one or two-by-two they leave their former land behind and settle into a new country, a new home, until almost the whole family is once again reunited.
I have often paused to observe the reaction of a family when a loved one walks through the sliding double doors that partition the secure area of the airport from the public. The person walks through those doors and a cry of excitement erupts from the family gathered below. The traveler runs down the long ramp with arms wide open and is soon smothered in the arms of parents, children, aunts, uncles, friends. They shout out their cries of welcome and hand over great bouquets of flowers. Some dance, some sing, some weep with the joy of it all. It’s a lovely sight to see, a powerful scene to behold.
The longer we live in this world, the greater the number of loved ones who emigrate from it to settle above. The longer our lives extend, the more we see our friends and family members set out for the distant shores of heaven. We spend much time on the “departures level,” bidding sad farewells to people we have known and loved, people we have cared for and admired. There are many heartbreaks, many tearful farewells.
Over time we come to realize that there are now fewer here than there, fewer behind than ahead. Knowing we have fewer people to bid us farewell and many more to greet us eases the pain of departure and enhances the joy of arrival. Departing is difficult when all the people we love are being left behind, but arriving is easy when we are joining a throng of those we have loved and lost.
The daughter whose mother is in heaven departs this earth eager to be with her, to see her again. The mother whose daughter is in heaven can hardly wait to arrive and feel those precious arms around her neck once more. Friends long to be reunited with friends, brothers with brothers, sisters with sisters.
Each understands that all of these losses have served to loosen their hearts from earth and set them in heaven. Each eagerly anticipates entering that blessed land, for they know that the pain of departure will be by far surpassed by the joy of arrival. Each acknowledges that when the time comes to depart earth and arrive in heaven, they may find themselves unable to move for the throng of people waiting to meet them, to greet them, to welcome them home.