Return of the Study Bible Junkie

A few days ago, I fed the monster. I bought not one, but two study Bibles!

Actually, to be fair to myself, one of them IS a gift.

The ESV Literary Study Bible

Apologetics Study Bible for Students, Black and Tan Simulated Leather

I promised my niece-in-law Olivia that I would buy her a nice new copy of the Apologetics Study Bible for Students; it was on sale at Lifeway so I picked it up there. It's an awesome HCSB Bible that's full of supplemental articles covering tons of issues that young people are likely to run into in college (or even in high school). How about an article on "If I Can't See God, How Do I Know He's Real?" or one about "Does the Bible Contain Errors?" or maybe "How Important Is Darwinian Evolution?" or "Aren't All Religions Basically the Same?" or "Can God Make A Rock So Big He Can't Lift It?" The answers are well thought out, logical, and meaningful. Here's a little more about this Bible:



While I was there, I took advantage of another sale that was going on... I picked up a hardback copy of The ESV Literary Study Bible for ten dollars(!) You can't beat a $35 Bible for a ten-spot, and if you read my previous Study Bible Junkie post, you already know that I was planning on picking one of these up anyway. So I saved myself some cash and picked it up early!

Am I an addict? Is this bad? Am I just buying multiple Bible so I can be smug about my Christianity? Well, I haven't bought them because it makes me feel more Christiany; I've bought them because it gives me multiple ways to learn about God's Word. I haven't read all of them yet... but I will. The old joke... the only useful Bibles are the "red" ones, because if you don't read 'em they can't help you... these will all eventually be "read" Bibles. And hopefully I'm modeling a reverence for God's Word for my children, and at the same time making a resource available for them when they are old enough to use it.

I have maybe three or four more "study Bibles" in mind that I would like to get my hands on, but I'm in no hurry to buy more of them. The ones I have will literally take me years to get through without ever reading the same one more than once (although I'll be looking at the ESV translation twice, because I have two different study Bibles with that translation) and when I run out, there will be something else new to check out... but even if I make it through all of them and study Bibles have suddenly stopped being made, we have enough Bible knowledge in just the six study Bibles in our library to start again at the beginning and learn all new stuff. In the United States of America in the year 2010 we are so blessed in the amount of sheer Bible knowledge that is available to us for very limited amounts of money. Some people graduate from seminary knowing less about the Bible than the information on my one bookshelf. What a blessing!

I'm going to go read my Bible now!