Did you know that Santa Claus is in the Bible? It is true; it says it as plain as day.
Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north, saith the LORD: for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the heaven, saith the LORD. Zech. 2:6 (KJV)
Well who do you think the Ho Ho from the north is? That’s right: Santa Claus. So there I just proved it to you, Santa Claus does exist.
Although this is a humorous illustration the truth behind the matter is very dangerous. People are bad about taking the Bible out of context; twisting it to say what they want it to say or what they believe it says. Both of these methods can be very destructive; understanding proper context is very, very important!
On the one hand you have those that live by and preach the “Kangaroo Gospel”; they hop around from verse to verse picking out what they like, to prove their point. Many people are confused and mislead because they do not stop to read what is before and after the portion of scripture read; they never get the whole picture. This is like someone pulling a few pieces out of a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle, having never looked at the box, and trying to guess what the picture is. They may have many logical guesses based on what they know; however they are often WRONG! We do not want to live our life based on bits and pieces of God’s word.
On the other hand you have the die hard misinterpreters of scripture. They read all of the scripture, think they understand what is said and come to strong conclusions. They live their entire lives based off of their understanding of scripture, yet they never stop to put it all in the context in which it was written; who was it written too? What was it written about? Why was it written in the first place? This is like you reading “Don’t do drugs!” and interpreting that to mean that you shouldn’t take an aspirin when you have a headache; you missed the point!
It is extremely important that we look at the Bible in the proper context. Sometimes this means we just need to read the whole chapter or book so that we can see what is really being said. Other times we need to do in depth study on what was going on in a certain area at the time that particular section of scripture was written. Strive to understand the Gospel for what it is: truth to live by. Take the time to get it right, I promise you it will change your life!
