a word before we begin

Most Christians are thirsty, and most of them are standing in water.

That is what this booklet is about. But two things first, so no one mistakes it.

It is not against teachers. I’ve had good ones and I still do, though most of mine are long dead and teach me from the pages they left behind. A good teacher is one of the kindest gifts God gives His church,1 and anyone who sneers at all of them has only found a prouder way to be a fool.

It is not against church, either. Keep gathering with God’s people, and keep sitting under the preaching of the Word.2 Don’t set yourself up as your own little pope, with a Bible on your knee and no one to answer to. That is a real error too, and there’s no sense climbing out of one ditch to fall into the other.

This booklet is about one plain fact, and most believers have never stopped to think about it.

The well is open.

The whole Word of God is open in your hands, in your own language, with the Hebrew and Greek beneath it and tools for digging into it that kings and scholars of other ages would have wept to own.3 And the Spirit who wrote it is ready to teach it to you Himself. The scandal is how many of God’s people are dying of thirst within arm’s reach of the water, waiting in a long, patient line for someone else to bring them a cup.

chapter one

the well is open

Picture a long line of people, each one waiting patiently for someone to bring them a cup of water. Not one of them has noticed that they are all standing knee-deep in a river.

You have been waiting in line for a cup of water while standing knee-deep in the river.

Jesus once sat, tired from the road, beside a well in Samaria. A woman came out to draw water, and He said to her:

If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.John 4:10

If thou knewest. The whole tragedy is in those three words. She didn’t know who was sitting in front of her.4 Her mind was on the deep well, the heavy bucket and the long walk back in the heat, and all the while the Fountain of living water5 sat beside her. She missed Him because she was thinking about the plumbing.

So does the church. We think about the well and the bucket: the teacher, the program, the study, the person up front who will fetch it down for us. And the One who is Himself the source is holding the living water out to us, freely, with His own hand.

The whole Word of God is open in your hands.6 Not a summary of it, not someone else’s feelings about it, not the thin gruel of a verse on a coffee mug, but the thing itself: all 66 books in your own language, and behind them the very Hebrew and Greek the Spirit moved holy men to write.

And you have more than the Book. You have its Author. The Holy Spirit lives in every believer, and He has pledged to be your Teacher.

But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance.John 14:26

He shall teach you. It does not say the Spirit shall teach the seminary, and the seminary the pastor, and the pastor the author, until the author at last hands you a fourth-hand sip. He shall teach you.

Spurgeon once said that if he had a book he couldn’t quite understand, it would be a great help to live next door to the author, so he could run in and ask what he meant. Then he told his hearers, “This is just your position, Christian.”7 The One who inspired the text lives in you, and there has never been a tutor like Him. He gives Himself to the newest and humblest child of God as fully as to the greatest scholar who ever lived.

So why are so many of us drinking from someone else’s cup?

We sit through a study about the Bible and read a small, pleasant book of someone’s thoughts about the Bible. We take in a teacher’s feelings about it, a podcast on it and a song loosely drawn from it, and we call all of that drinking. Meanwhile the river runs clear and cold at our feet, and we won’t bend down to it.

This is no small failing, and I won’t pretend it is. It is the strange tragedy of the modern church: a people dying of thirst beside an open spring, sure the water has to be fetched for them, when it was never shut at all.

The well is open. It has stood open longer than anyone alive has drawn breath. The wonder isn’t that God opened it, because He has always meant His people to know Him.8 The wonder is how few of us have noticed, and walked down, and drunk.

what this Book is

is waiting for you

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sources & notes

  1. Ephesians 4:11–12: “And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.”
  2. Hebrews 10:25: “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”
  3. For example, James Strong, The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (New York: Hunt & Eaton, 1890), which keys every word of the King James Version to the Hebrew or Greek word beneath it; and Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1906). Both are now free to anyone with a phone.
  4. Matthew Henry, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments (London, 1708–1710), vol. 5, on John 4:10: “Though Christ is set before us, and sues to us in and by his gospel, yet there are multitudes that know him not. They know not who it is that speaks to them in the gospel, that saith, Give me to drink; they perceive not that it is the Lord that calls them.”
  5. Jeremiah 2:13: “For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.” Henry, on John 4:10, reads the living water as the Spirit Himself: “By this living water is meant the Spirit, who is not like the water in the bottom of the well … but like living or running water, which was much more valuable.”
  6. A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications, 1948), chap. 6, “The Speaking Voice”: “If you would follow on to know the Lord, come at once to the open Bible expecting it to speak to you. Do not come with the notion that it is a thing which you may push around at your convenience. It is more than a thing, it is a voice, a word, the very Word of the living God.”
  7. C. H. Spurgeon, “How to Read the Bible,” sermon on 1 Timothy 4:13, preached at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, June 21, 1866, in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, vol. 58 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1912): “Commentators and expositors are very useful indeed, but the best expositor is always the author of a book himself. … This is just your position, Christian. The book will sometimes puzzle you, but the divine author, who must know his own meaning, is ever ready to lead you into its meaning. He dwelleth in you.”
  8. Jeremiah 31:34: “And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD.” Quoted again in Hebrews 8:11.
  9. The Greek word is theopneustos, “God-breathed,” found only here in the New Testament. Peter’s words are in 2 Peter 1:21.
  10. John 17:17; Psalm 119:160; and Titus 1:2: “In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began.”
  11. Psalm 12:6.
  12. Psalm 119:89; and John 10:35, where His argument in verses 34–36 rests on the one word “gods” in Psalm 82:6.
  13. Psalm 12:7; Matthew 24:35; and Matthew 5:18: “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.”
  14. 1 Peter 1:23. Verses 24 and 25 go on to quote Isaiah 40:8.
  15. Eltjo Buringh and Jan Luiten van Zanden, “Charting the ‘Rise of the West’: Manuscripts and Printed Books in Europe,” Journal of Economic History 69, no. 2 (2009); and Max Roser and Esteban Ortiz-Ospina, “Literacy,” Our World in Data (University of Oxford, 2018). Literacy remained a minority attainment through most of human history.
  16. Stephan Füssel, Gutenberg and the Impact of Printing (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005). A hand-copied manuscript Bible represented many months of a scribe’s labor and commanded roughly a laborer’s yearly wage; Gutenberg’s printed Bible (c. 1455) sold at about 30 florins, reckoned as some three years’ wages for a clerk.
  17. Colossians 4:16: “And when this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and that ye likewise read the epistle from Laodicea.” See also Colossians 3:16 and 1 Thessalonians 5:27.
  18. Alexander Cruden’s A Complete Concordance to the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament (London, 1737), for one, and James Strong’s The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (New York: Hunt & Eaton, 1890), which indexes every word of the King James Version.
  19. John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes (London, 1563), the account of Tyndale’s exchange with a learned man, in which Tyndale declares he would cause “a boy that driveth the plough” to know more of Scripture than his opponent. The saying is preserved by Foxe and cannot be independently traced before him, though it accords with Tyndale’s stated aim in his 1530 preface to the Pentateuch.
  20. Malachi 3:6: “For I am the LORD, I change not”; and Hebrews 13:8, which speaks of Christ Himself. The Word does not change because the One who speaks it does not.
  21. Psalm 119:105.
  22. Mark 7:13: “Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.” See also Isaiah 29:13.
  23. Ephesians 4:30: “And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption”; and 1 Thessalonians 5:19: “Quench not the Spirit.”
  24. 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
  25. Matthew 5:8: “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.”
  26. Job 23:12: “I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food”; and Jeremiah 15:16: “Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart.”
  27. 2 Timothy 3:16.
  28. Acts 20:27.
  29. Nehemiah 8:3: “And he read therein before the street that was before the water gate from the morning until midday, before the men and the women, and those that could understand; and the ears of all the people were attentive unto the book of the law.” Verse 5 adds that when Ezra opened the book, “all the people stood up.”
  30. McGee was pastor of the Church of the Open Door, Los Angeles, until he retired in 1970 to give himself to the radio ministry. His teaching is in Thru the Bible with J. Vernon McGee, 5 vols. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1981–1983). The radio program began in 1967 and today takes its listeners through the whole Bible in five years before beginning again at Genesis.
  31. 2 Peter 1:20: “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.”
  32. e-Sword (e-sword.net) is free Bible software for the computer, with the King James Version keyed to Strong’s Hebrew and Greek dictionaries and commentaries such as Matthew Henry’s. Blue Letter Bible (blueletterbible.org) does the same in a web browser or a phone app, linking every word to its Strong’s number. Dr. J. Vernon McGee’s Thru the Bible is free at ttb.org and in its app, and Dr. Jerry Vines’s sermons are at jerryvines.com.
  33. Matthew Henry, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 5 vols. (London, 1708–1710); C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, 7 vols. (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1869–1885), his commentary on the Psalms; Warren W. Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary, 2 vols. (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1989); and J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible with J. Vernon McGee, 5 vols. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1981–1983).
  34. Deuteronomy 29:29: “The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.”
  35. Ezekiel 34:2; 2 Peter 2:3: “And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you”; and 1 Peter 5:2: “Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind.”
  36. Ephesians 4:12–14: “For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: that we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine.”
  37. Genesis 3:1–5. The serpent’s first words were a question about what God had said: “Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?”
  38. 2 Timothy 1:7; and Isaiah 46:10: “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.”
  39. Hebrews 5:13–14: “For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.” Paul’s words are 1 Corinthians 3:2.
  40. 1 Peter 2:2: “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.”
  41. 2 Peter 3:18: “But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.”
  42. John Foxe, Actes and Monuments (London, 1563), on Tyndale’s betrayal by Henry Phillips, his imprisonment at Vilvoorde, and his execution by strangling and burning on October 6, 1536; Foxe records his last words at the stake as the prayer, “Lord, open the king of England’s eyes.”
  43. Matthew Henry, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 5 vols. (London, 1708–1710); C. H. Spurgeon, The New Park Street Pulpit and The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, 63 vols. (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1855–1917); A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications, 1948); H. A. Ironside’s expositions of the books of the Bible (Loizeaux Brothers); Warren W. Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary, 2 vols. (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1989); and J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible with J. Vernon McGee, 5 vols. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1981–1983).
  44. 1 Corinthians 3:6: “I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.”
  45. Hebrews 13:7: “Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation.”
  46. John 4:13–14, 28–29: “Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst … The woman then left her waterpot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men, Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ?”
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