[MC1171611]

Buzzoff, the Bible is both simple to understand and extremely complex: while it's easy to understand doctrines and what God says in His word the Bible, the Bible is more than just what you see upon a cursory look.

The easiest way to clear up confusion is to understand that like a letter, the Bible is not entirely written TO you. You can gain an incredible amount of wisdom and knowledge from someone else's mail, but to follow the instructions written to someone else is not a good idea. You have to understand where you fit into the picture and read YOUR mail to know exactly what God wants from you.

There are three groups of people in the Bible: Jews, Gentiles and the Church (made up of Born-Again Christians). Genesis 1 through 12 deal with the Gentiles; from then on, God deals specifically with His people, the Jew, until Acts chapters 9 through about chapter 13, when the Lord begins dealing specifically with the Church. Your mail, the portions of Scripture most pertinent to YOU as a Blood-Bought Believer in Christ, is found in Romans through Philemon. This is where you compare everything else to, this is where you get your doctrine from, and this is the most important part of the Bible to keep you in the Truth of God's Word.

If you're confused as to what the Bible means in a certain spot, or why it says something that doesn't make sense compared to somewhere else, check the address (so to speak); usually you'll find you're reading someone else's mail, and while that's not a problem, just be careful that you don't apply to yourself the commands that God gave to someone else in another time period.