What Is Biblical Theology? Why Does It Matter?

What Biblical Theology Is

Ken: So Nancy, we’re both passionate about Biblical theology. The way I define it, which is, I think, in line with Voss, which means this has to be the right way to define it…

Nancy: Ah, Geerhardus Voss, the grandfather of Biblical theology, yes.

Ken: … is it’s arranging the truths that God has revealed in the Scriptures, more chronologically than logically. Systematic Theology: not so much concerned about the chronology. Biblical theology: starting from the very primitive idea of the doctrine and then tracing the way it builds up through the rest of Scripture.

Nancy: I like that. I think that what I’ve come to think about Biblical theology is that it is a way of looking at the Bible that understands the Bible – while it has many human authors – has one divine author and he’s telling us a story about what he’s doing in the world, to have a people for himself, that is centered on the person of Jesus Christ.

Ken: I think I like your version better.

The Divine Author’s Message

Nancy: Well, they’re both good. And I would also say about Biblical theology, one thing that has helped me with it, in fact I got to hear you preach this morning and you actually did this in your sermon, but that the divine author has written into his book a number of themes. And once we understand what those themes are, those themes help us to get out, “What does the divine author really want me to know from reading the Bible?”

And I think that helps us, don’t you, Ken? It helps us from making the Bible about things it’s not really intended to be about and it helps us get the message the divine author wants us to get.

Ken: Yeah that’s very helpful. So as opposed to taking the Bible and seeing it as having multiple, just a diverse set of doctrines that are in many ways unrelated, you get to see the things that the divine author views as highly important.

Nancy: And also, most of my life I saw the Bible as a bunch of stories that were unrelated, you know? I grew up understanding many stories in the Bible but I’d be kind of embarrassed for you to know how recently I could articulate for you the story of the Bible.

And you know, we could tell that story in four words. Let’s try. So we could say: Creation and we could say Fall or Rebellion. Redemption. Consummation. I mean, there’s the story of the Bible. And understanding that has made so much of the Bible fall into place for me.

Christ At The Heart Of Biblical Theology

Nancy: So, how did you grow to love biblical theology?

Ken: I think in hearing it preached. When you hear it – how beautiful it is.

Nancy: Yes, because it gets to Christ, it always gets to Christ. No matter where we are, that story line comes to the person and work of Christ that melts our hearts and causes us to love him more.

Ken: Yeah, I’d say so the first time I came across it – a book called “God’s Big Picture.” So very simple, by Vaugh Roberts. Very, very simple. It’s simple enough for a little child actually to be able to trace that theme of the Kingdom through the Scriptures. But that little taste of, “Okay, here’s one theme that you can use,” just opened up the rest of the teachers for this.

Or “According to Plan”, became the place again to jump in and those people start rearranging the way in which you see how the Bible can come together.

The Need For Biblical Theology

Nancy: You know, I’ve been on a mission – starting here in the States but then working my way out – a mission to infiltrate Women’s Bible study with Biblical theology. Do you sense the need for that in Africa?

Ken: Huge, huge. So, in Africa, one of the biggest challenges facing the church is false teaching and biblical theology can really help address that. So, not merely with chasing down all the different topics where, okay, that’s wrong, that’s wrong, that’s wrong. Instead, coming to the Scriptures and seeing how the story comes together so that when someone goes to the Old Testament and quotes for you a promise and pulls it out of its context, all of a sudden you go like ‘that does not fit in to the story that the Lord is weaving from the very beginning to the very end.’

So I think it’s a great tool in Africa to stave off, to push off the false teaching that is fighting, that is attacking the church.

Nancy: Absolutely. Biblical theology: I always feel my aim when I am presenting it is that it would cause us to love Christ more as we see more of his beauty and to long more for his return.