Knowing the Scriptures: Rules and Methods of Bible Study

by Arthur Tappan Pierson

The highest secret of Bible study, however, is that teachable spirit which is inseparable from obedience. Spiritual vision, like the physical, is binocular: it depends on both reason and conscience. If the intellectual faculties are beclouded, the moral sense is apt to err in its decisions; and, if the conscience be seared, the reason is blinded. Our Lord says, “If any man will do His will he shall know of the doctrine” (John 7:17); in other words obedience is the organ of spiritual revelation. Insight into the scriptures is never independent of the obedient frame, but is conditioned upon actual conformity to their precepts and sympathy with their spirit. True biblical learning is not so much mental as experimental. There are professed teachers and preachers who no more grasp the truth they nominally hold than does the sparrow grasp the message that passes through the telegraph wire on which it perches—as Norman McLeod quaintly put it.

419 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 9, 2013

About the author

Arthur Tappan Pierson (March 6, 1837 – June 3, 1911) was an American Presbyterian pastor, early fundamentalist leader, and writer who preached over 13,000 sermons, wrote over fifty books, and gave Bible lectures as part of a transatlantic preaching ministry that made him famous in Scotland and England. He was a consulting editor for the original "Scofield Reference Bible" (1909) for his friend, C. I. Scofield and was also a friend of D. L. Moody, George Müller (whose biography 'George Muller of Bristol' he wrote), Adoniram Judson Gordon, and C. H. Spurgeon, whom he succeeded in the pulpit of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, London, from 1891 to 1893. Throughout his career, Pierson filled several pulpit positions around the world as an urban pastor who cared passionately for the poor.

Reviews

[Simeon Brazzell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite possibly my most referred to book when I'm confused on how to interpret a portion of Scripture. This guidebook is an overview on how to interpret the different types of literature found in the Bible. Easy to read and understand as well