The Bible is Perspicuous but what does that mean?

This word that you may not know is very important in Biblical counseling and in the class I am teaching we are going to talk about this concept a couple of different times.

Basically it means "the Bible is clear."
Now don't misunderstand this word.  It does NOT mean everything in the Bible is easy to understand.

A major part of Biblical counseling is the counselor/disciple-maker helping the counselee/disciple understand the truths of God's word so it can be properly lived out.
The counselor/disciple-maker does not want to set himself up as THE ONE source of truth.

In teaching this class, in developing EBC's children's ministry, in teaching classes and in parenting, I want to help people grow in their desire to know God through His Word.  Not only when I am presenting it but also when my children, the families in EBC's children's ministry and the people I am teaching are studying it on their own.

As it relates to the Bible and children here are two principles taken from an article entitled The Perspicuity of the Scripture . (www.tms.edu/tmsj/msj15.2.pdf)

Parents can teach Scripture to their children and children can learn them.

Deuteronomy 6;6, 7 gives parents a command.  “And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise”

 Even a child can understand Scripture’s message.

In 2 Timothy 3:14-15a Paul tells Timothy  “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings. . . ” 

If parents are to teach the Bible to their children and adults are told to remember what they learned as children, it must be true that their doesn't need to be some secret knowledge or years of training to understand the truths of the Bible.

"Protestants hold that the Bible, being addressed to the people is sufficiently perspicuous to be understood by them, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit; and that they are entitled and bound to search the scripture and to judge for themselves what is its true meaning"
(The Master's Seminary Journal, p. 209)