Wheat field Banner

Gleanings From The Word

Category: Acts

  • Knowing the Bible like the back of my hand

    Knowing the Bible like the back of my hand

    Knowing the bible like the back of your hand

    If I said to you that I know something like the back of my hand, you would understand what I meant. It’s an English language idiom that means “to have very good and detailed knowledge of something.”

    If someone said to you, “I know the bible like the back of my hand,” you would understand them to mean a deep understanding of the Scriptures, likely with large portions memorized, a more-than-average understanding of the various books, their contexts and how they come together. Honestly, it’s a pretty bold claim.

    While the Bible doesn’t use that idiom, it could be said of the Pharisees and teachers of the Law in Jesus day. They knew what we call the Old Testament backward and forward and could likely recite at least the first five books word for word. They also understood all the rabbinical interpretations and applications. I would love to have their knowledge.

    The man we come to know as Paul the Apostle was once known as Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee of Pharisees. He was highly regarded as a zealot, a teacher and a persecutor of the Christian faith. He stood by and held Stephen’s cloak as Stephen was being stoned to death for his beliefs. No one doubted his sincerity, his knowledge or his passion.

    Despite all that, Saul was missing something. He didn’t yet know Jesus. That would come later in a divine encounter on the Damascus Road.

    Without Christ, all his knowledge, his years of study, the sincerity of his beliefs and his zeal were meaningless. He was doomed to eternal damnation.

    In Acts, Paul says; I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but having been brought up in this city, having been instructed at the feet of Gamaliel according to the strictness of the law of our fathers, being zealous for God just as you all are today. Acts 2:3

    Throughout Paul’s writings, we see that he came to understand that Jesus was the promised Messiah and that we are saved by faith through God’s grace and mercy, bought by the shed blood of Jesus.

    For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, so that no one may boast. Ephesians 2:8-9

    Paul also teaches that we need to know the Word, to understand what it teaches and apply it to our lives. To be a Christian takes faith, but that doesn’t exclude knowledge.

    All the “head knowledge” in the world, even if you can say you know the Bible, church history and theology like “the back of my hand”, without that moving to your heart and manifesting as faith, it’s useless.

    Faith isn’t a blind leap. You have to have enough knowledge to know you are a sinner and what you need to be reconciled to God. Our walk isn’t a question of faith versus knowledge. It’s faith and knowledge. 

    Faith saves you, and the knowledge and its application deepen your relationship. With Christ. The way to reconciliation with God

    I pray you have the faith to be saved, and the head knowledge to understand. I pray that your love for Jesus and knowledge of what He requires move you to application (works)

    Hallelu Yah (Praise God) 

    Be blessed 

    Kevin 

    Soli Deo Gloria (For the glory of God alone) 

    SUMMARY

    Knowing Scripture deeply is admirable, but even the most profound biblical knowledge is worthless without personal faith in Jesus Christ. True Christian living requires both — faith that saves and knowledge that deepens the relationship.

    KEY POINTS

    Saul of Tarsus had unmatched scriptural knowledge yet was lost without Christ, proving that head knowledge alone cannot save. 

     Salvation comes by grace through faith — not works or intellectual achievement — as Paul himself came to understand after his Damascus Road encounter. 

     Faith and knowledge are not opposites; faith saves us, while growing in the Word deepens our walk with Christ and moves us toward application.

    Enjoyed this? Want daily devotionals? Subscribe today 

    All contents, “Gleanings From the Word” and “Experience an Extraordinary God in Ordinary Life,” are © 2001, 2026 K.F. “Kevin” Corbin, “Gleanings From the Word.” All rights reserved.

    Scripture quotations are from the Legacy Standard Bible® (LSB®), Copyright © 2021 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Managed in partnership with Three Sixteen Publishing Inc. 

    From Gleanings From The Word (Kevin Corbin, 2001– ), a Scripture-based devotional work.

    You might also like “Read the Word” and “Purpose in the Process”

  • Small Steps, Big Kingdom: What Beavers Teach Us About How God Grows His Church

    Aerial view of world'slongest beaver damn - small steps produce big results

    The beaver is famed for being an industrious builder. Stick by stick, twig by twig, packing with mud as they go, they close off waterways. It’s all accomplished in small steps.

    According to Parks Canada “The world’s largest beaver dam is visible from space in satellite images. It is almost 800 meters long from end-to-end, and holds back run-off water from the Birch Mountains in the southernmost end of Wood Buffalo National Park.”

    The front of the actual dam runs approximately 775 meters in length. The entire perimeter of the dam area is close to 2000 meters. The surface area is approximately 70,000 square meters. The pond formed by the dam is probably one meter deep, which means it would contain about 70,000 cubic meters of water.”

    There is one major lodge on the site, which means 4-8 beavers. This likely took 40 years and multiple generations to build. That’s an incalculable number of small steps.

    It reminds me of the way Jesus built his church. The kingdom grows in small steps. It’s spread person to person, one soul at a time. Why the Lord chose to do it that way is a mystery to me. Surely there must have been a more efficient option.

    Yet somehow it makes sense. 

    God’s kingdom often begins in ways that appear small, weak, or unnoticed, but through His power it grows steadily and accomplishes His purposes.

    He presented another parable to them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field; and this is the smallest of all seeds, but when it is fully grown, it is the largest of the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.” Matthew 13:31-32

    Ordinary people, like you and me, spread the gospel. We grow the kingdom step by small step. 

    Before the day of Pentecost, Jesus’ ministry had produced about 120 converts. There was a miraculous supernatural harvest on that day, but typically it’s spread one-to-one.

    From humble beginnings, now over 2 billion people claim to be followers of Christ. We know that figure includes many who are not true believers, but person by person and generation to generation, the small steps have paid off.

    As a believer, you are part of something much larger than you can imagine. Keep taking those small steps of faith and obedience. Incremental change over time yields huge transformations.

    Keep sowing and growing. The harvest is plentiful. Lets do our part.

    Hallelu Yah (Praise God) 

    Be blessed 

    Kevin 

    SUMMARY:

    Just as beavers build the world’s largest dam one twig at a time over generations, God’s kingdom grows through small, faithful steps — person by person, soul by soul — from 120 disciples to over 2 billion followers of Christ.

     

    KEY POINTS

    The world’s largest beaver dam stretches nearly 800 meters and took an estimated 40 years and multiple generations to complete, built entirely through countless small, incremental actions.

    Jesus compared the kingdom of heaven to a mustard seed — the smallest of seeds that grows into the largest garden plant — reflecting how God’s purposes advance through what appears weak or unnoticed.

    From 120 converts before Pentecost to more than 2 billion today, the gospel has spread one person at a time, reminding believers that their small steps of faith and obedience are part of something far greater than they can see. 

    You might also enjoy “Busy beaver, another helper” and “God is closer than you think.”