When the author of Hebrews tells us that the Father speaks to the Son in the words of Psalm 2…we should look back to Psalm 2 and ask in what ways the Father and Son are present there. When we do, we find new depths of interpretation open to us as we allow Hebrews to guide us in reading the psalms in the full context of God’s revelation.

What Rereading Reveals

There are books that demand a second reading. All the great books do. Masters of the literary craft can structure their stories in such a way that the beginning gains new significance—gains its true significance—only in light of the end.

Now, over the past several years, I have developed a fondness for murder mystery novels. I am not entirely sure what this may say of me. Perhaps I have an unhealthy preoccupation with death. Perhaps I am approaching middle age. Whatever the cause, it has happened. I enjoy relaxing with a mystery novel and following the road the author paves.

Let me tell you, a second reading of an Agatha Christie mystery is an entirely different experience than the first. In the first reading, you are the amateur detective. You are tasked with identifying which clues are, and are not, significant. It can be maddening to develop a theory that seems to explain everything, only to be thwarted by some new piece of evidence. And then, finally, at the end, all the pieces snap into place and you see what you had been missing all along. You exult in guessing correctly, you are simultaneously disappointed and thrilled at having been wrong, or you simply marvel at the execution of a well-finished work.

On a second reading, however, it is as if you are reading with Christie herself. She shows you how to compose a good tale, how to build suspense, how to misdirect an investigation, and how to hide a clue in plain sight. The book does not lose all pleasure because you know how it ends, rather the pleasure of reading changes and deepens. You see clearly both the story and the way the story is told. You find more of the true significance of things when you read the beginning in light of the end.

The books of the Bible also demand rereading. This is true on the merely literary level. They are wonders of production that unfold the more we are familiar with them. But it is all the more true since they are Scripture. Our God always says exactly what he means, and each word is in harmony with the whole.

That we know Jesus will be crucified and raised does not diminish the power of the Gospel narratives, but rather it fills every event and saying with more meaning. The one who has power over death dies for us.

When in Mark the first human to recognize Jesus as the “Son of God” is the centurion at his death (Mark 15:39), we are led to a greater understanding of Mark 1:1: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” We see only then that Jesus’s nature and role as God’s Son is understood not chiefly in his teaching or his miracles but in light of his death. The Son of God is the one who died for us. We cannot know him otherwise.

This pattern is true not only for particular biblical books but also for the Bible as a whole. The garden gains new meaning from Revelation’s garden city (Rev 22:1–2). We understand that God spoke heaven and earth into being more when we know that “in the beginning was the Word” (John 1:1).

One of the disciplines we must grow in as Christians is not merely reading the Bible, but in learning to reread. And I mean this in at least three ways. We must learn how to re-read individual books of the Bible, the whole Bible, and books of the Bible in conversation with one another. Below are a small handful of examples of how intentional rereading can benefit our understanding.

Read More