I came by an active curiosity honestly. My dad, a coal miner with a 7th grade education, was interested in everything. He read and learned and talked to us of all kinds of subjects.
In college, I changed majors from physics to history because the history professor had the most wonderful imagination and made history come alive. Every class was a delight.
Nothing is off limits to history. It deals with the grand scope of humanity on this small planet.
That did it for me.
In 2012 I made a life-changing trip to Southern Italy. After several days of ministering to pastors and spouses from churches of numerous countries, some of us spent several hours touring the ruins of Pompeii, the Italian city devastated by the eruption of Vesuvius in August of A.D. 79. It was truly unforgettable. So much so, that….
After arriving home in New Orleans, the very next afternoon I was in our public library reading up on Pompeii. I checked out a Robert Harris novel titled Pompeii, and finished it the next night.
Since then, I have read a half-dozen books on Pompeii.
Question: Of what possible use was this in my ministry?
Answer: It’s impossible to know. Just as God uses all our experiences from celebrations to suffering in ministry, so He uses what we learn from everything we read.
A great curiosity is a wonderful thing for any Christian to have, but particularly for preachers. Why?
Curiosity makes you a more interesting, well-rounded person, but also a better Bible student.
Ask any mother of a three-old. All day long the toddler follows her around asking, “Why?”
He’s growing.
The curious student of God’s Word will bring several questions, among others, to the study of Scripture:
–1.What happened here? Before turning my imagination loose on the narrative, I must learn the story itself.
–2. Why did this happen? Why was this included in Holy Scripture? Sometimes the answer is obvious, sometimes it takes effort on our part to figure it out. And some we never learn.
–3. What does it mean?
We feel certain that God has not included extraneous material in the Word, although much of it is different from the rest and not all will have identical values for us. But, studying a passage, asking “what does it mean?” is good.
–4. What was it like to have been there?
We try to envision the scene Scripture describes. What was going on? Who was present and what were they thinking/doing? What would I have been doing had I been present?
—5. Am I missing anything? One of the best ways to answer this is by studying what others have written on this text. (And don’t we love it when a writer tells us something we had missed!)
Curiosity takes Scripture seriously.
I love the mini-parable our Lord gave in Matthew 13:52. A scribe who is instructed into the kingdom is like a householder who goes into his treasure and brings forth old things and new.
A scribe in New Testament times would have been called an expert in the Old Testament. Now, lead him to Christ and have him be born again. (That is what “instruct into the kingdom” means.) Now, returning to his treasure–the Scriptures–he finds all those riches he had grown to love over the years. But each time, using the new eyes and renewed mind and being guided by the Holy Spirit, he finds new treasures.
I am of the opinion that Scripture is inexhaustible, that the diligent student never reaches the bottom of this well.
Our Lord’s promise to those who know the Word and then come to know its Author is just that: They will never stop making discoveries in it.
This is surely what happened to Saul of Tarsus after meeting our Lord in the Damascus-Road experience of Acts 9. Now, from Luke’s account in Acts, we would not know this. However, we have Galatians chapter 1 where Paul told us something unexpected:
I did not consult immediately with anyone. I did not go up to Jerusalem to those who had become apostles before me; instead I went to Arabia and came back to Damascus. Then, after three years I did go up to Jerusalem….
Three years in the desert? That seems to be what he is saying.
Three years? Why, that is the same length of time the other apostles had with our Lord during His earthly ministry. So, is Paul saying that he was given the same privilege?
We can imagine Paul pouring over the Old Testament scriptures–the only Bible anyone had!–and seeing Jesus all through it. And the result is seen in the various epistles, particularly in Galatians and Romans.
A healthy curiosity must always be yielded to the Holy Spirit and instructed by Scripture.
Novelist Anne Rice wrote a story from her active imagination on the boyhood of Jesus in Nazareth. When I saw in a review that she had the Lord performing childish miracles, that did it for me. He did no such thing. And how do we know that? Consider this….
Scripture says plainly that the miracle at the wedding of Cana was His first miracle (John 2:11). There is no record anywhere of a previous miracle. In fact, childhood miracles–as though Jesus were Superboy of Smallville–would have been detrimental to His later work for many reasons. Had the young Jesus been performing miracles in Nazareth, the townspeople would not have been surprised when the adult Jesus began ministering and healing. And yet not only were they surprised, they were hostile and angry at the very idea. Furthermore, had the boy Jesus been performing miracles, the murderous Satan would have identified Him and done all in his power to destroy Him then and there. But none of that happened, because the Heavenly Father planned for Jesus to grow up a normal Jewish boy, indistinguishable from all the other young men of that region.
We’re told that Jesus’ neighbors were amazed when He began preaching and working miracles (see Luke 4:28-29 and Mark 6:1-6). Had they seen Him do wonders as a teenager, some would have been saying, “Yes sir, I told you that boy was bound for bigger things!” But no one thought it and no one said it because Jesus didn’t do it.
Our curiosity can get us in big trouble–off on strange tangents and into doctrinal quicksand–unless it is consecrated to the Lord Jesus Christ and subjected to God’s Word.
The enemy will often attack you at the point of your curiosity and imagination.
First, Satan will want to bore you with the Word. “There’s nothing there. You have been there and done that, friend.” He is a liar, of course (John 8:44). This is the most fascinating book ever!
Second, he will excite your curiosity and imagination over forbidden fruits, into more exotic fields. Early in my ministry, a young couple decided our church was too boring and left because they had discovered the occult. While Scripture nowhere says there is nothing to the occult and forces of darkness–Satan has great power–it emphatically stresses that God’s people should avoid them.
Third, if you insist on bringing your curiosity to Scriptures and employ your imagination in the service of the Savior, the devil will attempt to divert it into meaningless pursuits. You will be tempted to devote hours, weeks, even years, looking into something that ends up yielding no fruit and having no meaning. We should always pray for the Spirit to lead us along paths of righteousness, for His name’s sake (Psalm 23:3).
You have come to the kingdom at a great time, friend.
This is a great day for a teacher or preacher who is in love with God’s creation, who is excited about God’s Word, and is thrilled to be teaching His message. The resources today seem to be without limit. The internet, the laptops, and the smart phones are incredible tools for research. (However, there is no substitute for the child of God sitting at a table before an open Bible with a note pad handy.)
Today, we can board a plane and be in Israel within 24 hours. We can walk where Jesus walked and see some of the very things His eyes took in. Returning home, we will forever see Scripture through different eyes.
Thanks to the internet, we can hear many of the best preachers in the world with very little effort. We can even hear messages from preachers who are now with God. And, If we have a question about something we heard–a quote, a reference, a historical event, a person, a fact–well, that’s all at our fingertips too.
There is no place for dullness in the Kingdom of God or in His work.
It is the work of the devil to a) make his followers dull-minded and b) hoodwink them into believing that they are the ones living exciting lives and that to follow Jesus would require them to check their brains at the door. The opposite is the case. The Apostle Peter told believers of his day, This is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men (I Peter 2:15). The ignorance of foolish men! That’s what Peter thought of the so-called “wisdom” of his day that was attacking God’s people.
So, bring your brain, friend. Bring your energy and imagination, your curiosity and your love for learning and growing. Bring it all into the Kingdom with you. Put them under the daily lordship of Jesus Christ and see what He wants to do with them.
