Hi ~

My last email may have made it sound like everything I learned about the Bible, I learned straight from God.

But that isn’t accurate. There were others along the way who offered key insights, some small pointers in the right direction, some foundational earth-movers.

Have you ever grasped a book in your hands, hugged it to your heart, lifted your eyes to heaven, and thanked God for that book because it helped you know Him better? Thanked God that this author spent the time and energy to write this book?

That’s happened to me a few times. If the author was still alive, I often wrote a note of thanks.

Some of these authors and speakers facilitated epiphanies for me that helped unlock the Scriptures, like being handed the schematic when you’re trying to put something together.

These truths helped lay the foundation for my Untwisting Scriptures work.

Here’s one.

In Untwisting Scriptures Book #2, I devoted a whole chapter to the ways the New Covenant is better than the Old. This was a fundamental, foundational principle to help combat some of the patriarchal teachings that have been used to oppress.

This lens—through which I read the entire Bible—is based primarily on the book of Hebrews, which I’ve studied several times. (And Galatians, and Romans, and some others.)

But there was another book that helped.

Andrew Murray’s book The Believer’s New Covenant hit me at exactly the time I needed it. I wrote about it briefly here, but there was so much more that this book helped me to appreciate about the New Covenant.

The Old Covenant, which of course is found in what we call the Old Testament, started with Moses on Mt. Sinai.

The New Covenant, found in the New Testament, started with Jesus at the Last Supper with His disciples.

And, as Hebrews 12 says, we have not come to Mt. Sinai. We have come to Mt. Zion. The better mountain—where our Lord Jesus has lived all the law flawlessly for us, died for our purification, and rose again for our victory over sin and death.

We are members of the New Covenant, not the Old. This makes a world of difference in applying the Scriptures.

The Scriptures, especially the book of Hebrews, make clear that the New Covenant is superior to the Old.

It also means that the entire Bible is ultimately about Jesus rather than rules.

When my husband Tim went to a conference, he learned something else from a speaker along these same lines. It was a principle I used when I did my “bitterness” word and subject study, the one that eventually went into Untwisting Scriptures Book #1.

Here it is:

When the New Testament quotes or alludes to the Old, the New Testament reference definitely sheds light on the Old.

And the Old Testament reference can also sometimes shed some added light on the New.

So every time the New Testament quotes the Old, read both Scriptures in the context of each other (with the New having greater weight because it is the expression of a better covenant).

Nowadays this seems obvious to me, but when we first learned it, it was a key to unlock more understanding of the Scriptures.

How about you?

Has there been a Biblically-based principle of interpretation that has “unlocked” understanding for you in the Scriptures? I would love to hear about it.

With you for a better understanding of God’s Word,

Rebecca

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