By Matt Friedeman and Lisa Friedeman Ausley
Francis Asbury Press, Wilmore  KY, 2009

The 20th century has seen every major Protestant denomination fight over the doctrine of the authority of Holy Scripture. Through all the theological wrangling, those who continued to profess their allegiance to God’s Word steadily decreased in their knowledge of it. Rare indeed was the book that actually equipped the average person (or the seminarian who never learned much of practical value in “exegesis” courses) to dig into God’s Word independently.

Following the tradition established by Wilbert Webster White at Biblical Seminary of New York at the turn of the last century, Life Changing Bible Study gives a new generation of learners the tools they need, in one simple volume, to begin serious “inductive Bible study” – the process of listening to Holy Scripture on its own terms instead of importing our own meaning into the text of God’s Word.

All texts teaching “inductive Bible study” follow a basic outline of Observation, Interpretation, Correlation, and Application. Particularly impressive in this work, however, are the many reminders about the large number of “structural laws” (pp. 47-49) that remind us of the many textual nuances in Scripture that allow us to understand the nuances used by the inspired authors to communicate the Truth.

Likewise, the chapter on interpretation is a judicious introductory discussion that should effectively inhibit the “wild” interpretations pastors fear people may arrive at, or at least form the basis for discussing why some interpretations are more likely valid than other ones.

The chapter on correlating one’s findings – “the analogy of Scripture” – in context with other occurrences of the same concept is most helpful.  One properly begins defining a term as used by the author in the text, the author’s other uses of the same concept, other uses within the same Testament, and how the concept in question is informed by the historical development of that concept in Scripture. Only then can correlation take place that responsibly uses outside sources.

Chapters on application and how to best communicate one’s “inductive” findings, and the use character studies to help personalize a study help round out this volume. These chapters too are excellent for pastors who want a private refresher from practiced communicators. Because one of the authors – Matt Friedeman –  is frequently heard on national radio explaining Scripture, one can hear the techniques described in practice – consider it a free ongoing continuing education for the book.

The only significant disagreement I might have with the text is the recommendation that New International Version is a Bible version well adapted to inductive Bible Study.  In general, I prefer the Holman Christian Standard Bible, New American Standard Update, or English Standard Version for inductive Bible study instead.  The free e-sword.net Bible study software will prove itself very helpful in the later stages of inductive Bible study because the King James text with every word identified by its Strong’s exhaustive concordance number will assist in the proper correlation of terms.
While Pastors will indeed find this to be an excellent tool for teaching inductive Bible study, a personal refresher for better exegesis, and a helpful manual for improving one’s preaching, ministers need more.

I suggest that while the basic structure of the text helps the average minister, there are important issues that cannot be uncovered without reference to at least a few key language tools such as Beale and Carson’s Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament . One issue that students of inductive Bible study (pastors, no less!) need to be familiar with is the concept of a text’s redemptive historical setting.  Without recognizing how individual “Bible stories” relate to the unfolding of God’s overall plan in Scripture, one risks turning the declaration of Almighty God into “Aesop over bagels” and sheer simplistic moralism abstracted from the story of the covenant-keeping God making good His promises through Jesus Christ. Because S.G. DeGraaf’s 4 volume series on the redemptive historical setting of the Bible’s stories is free online, it too should be consulted in the correlation phase.*

Likewise, there are current discussions in hermeneutics which cannot and should not be covered in such an introductory text. For instance, the concept of “intertextuality”, how New Testament writers refer to, allude to, and incorporate Old Testament narrative content and categories without modern documentation and, sometimes, with minimal disclosure.  With these caveats in mind, pastors should embrace this work enthusiastically and use it to help their congregations learn how to dig into scripture for themselves!