Lesson 6

Besides using a dictionary, another way to define a word is to see how it is used in a sentence. Words can convey different emotions, and inferences depending on how the sentence is structured. Look for verses using the same word and see if it has a positive or negative connotation. What examples are used when defining the word? The linguistic roots of a word will often provide insight to its meaning and intent. This may seem like a big challenge, but discovering what God inspired to be recorded is vital if we are to comprehend his full message. When people use different definitions for terms and words than what were used when God inspired the authors, the message will be changed. One example of this is how the Jewish religion never embraced the idea of the immortal soul until well into the second temple period. Before then, God established the Jewish religion on the writings of Moses, who understood that life after death totally relied on God. Believing the Old Testament scriptures could be interpreted through the lens of the immortal soul doctrine is the opposite of what God had inspired. Verses in the Old and New testaments have translated death as sleep, or an unconscious state where all physical and cognitive activities cease to function. Believing scripture should be interpreted contrary to a biblically supported one using superior modern wisdom and understanding is self delusional and is not letting the Bible interpret itself. Do you strictly follow the interpretations the Bible uses for its words? Does the Bible provide abundant support for your beliefs? Does the Bible contradict itself? Can the meaning and intent God originally inspired to be used be improved upon by us?

Isaiah 5:20-24 Living Bible
20 They say that what is right is wrong and what is wrong is right; that black is white and white is black; bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter. 21 Woe to those who are wise and shrewd in their own eyes! 22 Woe to those who are “heroes” when it comes to drinking and boast about the liquor they can hold. 23 They take bribes to pervert justice, letting the wicked go free and putting innocent men in jail. 

Ecclesiastes 9:5 Evangelical Heritage Version
5 At least the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing. They have no further reward, because all memory of them is forgotten.

Genesis 6:3 New International Version
3 Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.”

1 Thessalonians 4:13 King James Version
13 But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.