Most Christians desire to have a better understanding of their Bibles. What they may not realize is that their desire cannot be ascertained without a better comprehension of what scripture refers to as the counsels of God. This is God's plan for the ages, or what could be termed "God's big picture." All too often contemporary Christian teaching concentrates on the comfort of the here and now, losing all connection with the eternal plan of God.
How to Better Understand the Bible explains how the true Christian has been sealed by God with the Holy Spirit. He is the spirit of adoption, enabling us to cry out from our hearts, "Abba, Father." Believers have this new relationship in which God is their Father and they are His children. But not only children, for God considers us His friends, and He will not hide from us any of the things He is going to do. The Spirit has been given to believers as their teacher. His mission is to take what has been given to Jesus of the Father and declare it to us, as well as showing us things to come.
Unique to the time of the Christian dispensation is the fact that the Holy Spirit has been sent down. He has revealed to us the mystery of God's will. In times past, God had kept hidden two vital truths which would serve to complete the revelation and knowledge of His counsels-the universal exaltation of Jesus Christ over all things, and the formation and existence of His body, the church. How to Better Understand the Bible organizes and explains from scripture the full knowledge of God's counsels. Every true Christian, as a member of Christ's body, has been given by God an intimate and privileged place in these counsels.