There is simply no excuse for people living in the United States of America to be ignorant of the word of God. There is at least one Christian church in every town, and anyone can find a Bible in a library or bookstore. Turn on the radio and you can tune into a Christian radio station. The strength of this country is rooted in its Christian value structure. Once these values are eroded we will have destroyed our common culture of freedom and justice for all.
There is still hope for individuals who desire to know the truth–who desire to be blessed of God in their daily lives. Jesus gave us the ultimate formula for spiritual success in only a few words: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it” (Luke 10:28, NIV). Those who are honestly seeking for truth should read the word of God and obey what it teaches.
However, Jesus also told us about a common error in his day. People were reading the Bible, but they were missing the point of what it was teaching. Jesus said: “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God” (Matthew 22:29). Jesus was saying that the Bible needed to be interpreted in light of the power of God. But what did Jesus mean by the power of God?
The apostle Paul would later shed some light on the power of God when He wrote: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile” (Romans 1:16). To Paul the power of God was the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Paul elaborated on this further in a letter to the church at Corinth where he stated: “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corthintians 1:18). Here he tells us that the power of God is the message of the cross.
The power of God is the gospel of Jesus Christ that points people to the message of the cross: “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
If we want to be blessed of God then we must hear the word of God and obey what it teaches us. But in order to obey the teachings we must understand the purpose of scripture is to point people to Jesus and His voluntary sacrifice for our sins. When we read the Bible we must read it in the light of the life and death of Jesus Christ–the message of the cross—the power of God.
~Stephen Beagles