As you study the Bible, the first line of thinking is about “he, she, they and them”. The pronouns are all third person. As you dig into what it meant to them there comes a point in time during Bible study when a necessary shift or turn of the pronouns must occur. The turn is from he to me…it is from them to us.
Then there is the necessary turn in adverbs. The adverbs must turn from then to now.
Staying in the world of the text is safe and cozy. It demands nothing more than for you to understand them. As long as pronouns are third person and as long as adverbs are distant there is now call to action or application.
We cannot keep Scripture at arms length and we cannot allow it to remain impersonal. Turning the pronouns and adverbs allows us take what it meant for them, then and fully incorporate the text into us, now.
One Response
This is a very helpful “next step” after dealing with the actual meaning of biblical pronouns, which was the topic of a book John Stott always wanted to write.