Here is a lecture based on my book 7 Things About the Bible I Wish All Christians Knew which has its own podcast and several episodes on my YouTube channel.
Scripture was not written to help you lose weight, find a better career, be more productive in the office, be a better you, or even discover yourself.
The purpose and power of Scripture is experienced in the discipline of immersing oneself daily into the mystery of God as he reveals himself in his word.
It is Scripture, under the Holy Spirit’s guidance, and with the tutelage of our church’s traditions, that enables us to achieve genuine and lasting transformation. It is by soaking ourselves in Scripture that we cultivate virtue, curate our character, and conform ourselves to the pattern of Christ.
To put it briefly, I like to say that the purpose of Scripture is that God’s people would attain knowledge of God, deepen their faith, abound in love for God and love for others, and enjoy the assurance of hope—these are things we get from Scripture!
Knowing God
One purpose of Scripture is to know God. To know who God is, what God does, God’s purpose for creation, his purpose to put all things under Christ, and for the church to reign with Christ over the new creation. This means, as you might expect, that there is much to know about God!
In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he prays a specific prayer for them: “I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better” (Ephesians 1:17). That is the purpose of Scripture reading, its study, meditation upon it, and preaching from Scripture: to know God better. Through our reading of Scripture, and the knowledge of God that it gives us, we begin to grasp ever more profoundly the love and beauty of the God who knows us and loves us.
Therefore, the goal of our instruction in the Scriptures is to know God better, so that we may grow in our love for God.
Faith
One thing that Scripture does is bring people to a point of faith.
In fact, when I first encountered Christianity and the Bible, one verse from John’s Gospel that I found particularly startling, confronting, and which elicited the first murmurs of faith was Jesus’s words in his speech directed at the Judean leaders: “Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life” (John 5:24). I saw here the promise of eternal life, the benefits of faith, and I experienced that kind of magnetic attraction to Jesus that the Gospels furnish by so wonderfully conveying the story and words of Jesus.
This is precisely what God’s word does, it creates faith, from the darkness of disbelief and despair, it plants the seeds that grow into trust in God, love for Christ, and listening to the Spirit. Or, as the apostle Paul said: “Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ” (Rom 10:17). Scripture is without a doubt the most successful evangelist there is, was, or will be!
The purpose of Scripture is to not to get a passing grade in Religion 101, rather, the purpose of Scripture is to bring people to believe in Jesus, to come to Jesus, to grasp hold of Jesus, to rest in the one whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light (Matthew 11:30).