Arthur's book on Jeremiah is largely born out of her desire to see more people studying the first thirty-nine books of the Bible, because, in her words, "that is where you meet God." She points out that the trials that have faced God's people through the ages are, in many ways, the same today as they were back then, and the answers found in Old Testament Scripture are as relevant today as they were thousands of years ago. "If we don't know the Word, we don't know God, and we're just tossed to and fro by any doctrine we are presented with. We've got to understand and know His ways, which also helps us to understand the times we're living in."
Scripture's ability to help people understand modern day circumstances was evident at a recent prayer gathering where Kay Arthur spoke. A woman came up to her afterwards to discuss some insights she had gotten while Arthur was reading from the book of Ezekiel. "She said, ‘when we were reading Ezekiel today, I noticed that it kept talking about the land, the land, the land.' And I said, ‘you're right. That's a very good observation.' We were reading it aloud, marking the text, and when you go through the Bible, starting in Genesis, and you mark every reference to the land of Israel (the land that God plans to give to Abraham as a covenant, as an everlasting possession) suddenly the Middle East situation and the idea of Israel giving away part of their land seems wrong, because they're going against the Word of God." In this way, students of the Bible develop their systematic or thematic studies directly from Scripture, rather than through the lens of a particular denominationally-based interpretation.
Equipping people to find truth for themselves through Bible study is a recurring theme for Arthur, who laments the fact that people, especially young adults, are in general reading less as time goes on, and therefore not studying the Bible. While she sees the value of teaching ministries, with her preaching on the radio and sermons available for download on the Internet, she is adamant that listening to teaching should never be a person's primary source for learning the Bible. "You can do it that way (listen to tapes, etc.) if you want to, but why would you prefer to listen to another person's take rather than teach yourself how to study and read the Word of God? I watch people's faces in the audience while I'm teaching, and many times, I can tell they are not thinking, ‘this is the Word of God.' Many times they're thinking, ‘I wish I had a dream, I wish I had a vision, I wish God would speak to me.' But He has spoken in the Word. Those are the very words of God, and if He's given me this Bible, why would I want to just sit and listen to other people teach?"
Arthur also bristles when she hears people differentiating between "devotions" and "Bible study," which she believes can and should be understood as one and the same. "Somebody said to me once, ‘I feel bad, because I'm spending time studying the Bible, but I need to have my devotions.' Well, what is ‘devotions,' but hanging on God's every word and wanting to know what He says and how to do it?"
"My goal is to get people to open their Bibles. I know many people use PowerPoint now, so that people can just look at texts on the screen. Yet, when I leave church, I'm not going to have that PowerPoint, but I will have my Bible. And when I mark my Bible and make it my own, and know what side of the page those verses are on, I have my tool with me all the time. So I tell people, even if they're using PowerPoint, take your Bible. Open it. Look at it. Check out the context of the passage—what comes before it, what comes after it on the page; it's so important. I find when I read through the Bible, book by book, the Holy Spirit begins to cross-reference the Word of God for me, bringing other Scriptures to mind, and then Scripture becomes the interpreter for Scripture."
Realizing that her life has not been easy or free of painful tragedies helps one to fully appreciate Kay Arthur's love of Scripture and passion for imparting that love to others. When her daughter-in-law died last August, Arthur had been studying the book of Job. "I remember telling God, ‘I don't understand this book. I'm going to have to read it again.' But just moving through and seeing those things about God and reading Job say, ‘this is my consolation' and ‘I rejoice in my unsparing pain that I have not denied the words of the Holy One,' I see now that God was preparing me for what was to come."
This truth became very practical recently when Arthur was with her granddaughter. "We were outside and it was about to rain, and she wanted to get back in the house, and I said, ‘yes, we'll go inside, but first, come here for a few minutes.' I took her out and the wind was blowing and we could hear the thunder in the background, and I said to her, ‘I want to read to you from Job.' I read from where it talks about the thunder in God's voice and the lightening in His hand.
You're sitting there reading these things about God, and all of a sudden everything else in life falls into place—you know that everything is under God's sovereign hand. As you read through a book and linger over the words, not rushing but savoring them, it's like food. When you eat fast, you take in more, but your insides don't have a chance to really digest the food well. Likewise, when you read quickly through a passage, you don't have time to fully digest it and allow it to nourish your spiritual person. We need to take time to savor the truth."
Something Arthur is doing to help her granddaughter learn to savor God's Word is to read through the book of Proverbs with her. At thirty-one chapters, many people make it a practice to read one chapter for each day of the month.
