Min. Eugene Howie: Bible Study Tips and Strategies Pt.1

Jacqui: 0:12

Greetings listeners. It's the first Tuesday and you know what we do on first Tuesdays here at the Bible Basics Podcast. We have an opportunity to hear from incredible Bible teachers who impart wisdom associated with engaging with God's Word, and today is no different. Today we are blessed to have Minister Eugene Howie. Minister Howie is a dynamic preacher, author, teacher and motivational speaker, celebrated for his leadership, youth mentorship and profound biblical knowledge. Raised in the Anacostia area of southeast Washington DC, he has dedicated his life to community service through mentoring, evangelism and imparting biblical principles. As an ordained deacon, licensed minister and missionary, Minister Howie is passionate about disseminating the gospel and inspiring others to live out their faith. He previously served as the chairman and CEO of the Children of Mine Center, a board member of the DC Baptist Convention and on the Executive Council at Providence Baptist Church. His efforts extend to significant contributions to the National African American Missions Conference and leading Sunday school at the First Baptist Church of Glena rden International. Moreover, he also serves as a facilitator at the National Capital Christian Education Conference and others, enhancing his role in religious education.

Jacqui: 2:15

Beyond his ecclesiastical duties, minister Howie is renowned as an inspirational speaker, leadership trainer and youth mentor. With over 15 years of dedicated service. His voice is well known on the 1450 WOL DC News Morning Light radio segment, where he's lauded for fostering personal growth, leadership skills and meaningful connections. His engaging presence and lighthearted humor allow him to connect deeply with his audience, driving them towards significant change and active participation. A certified trainer by the American Management Association, Minister Howie has pursued education at DC public schools, Montgomery College and the University of Maryland University College. He is also the author of The Awakening, a book that cements his reputation in motivational speaking and leadership training.

Jacqui: 3:27

Married to his beloved wife, Cynthia, for 21 years, Minister Howie adheres to a philosophy of loving people to life, not hating them to death. Reflecting his belief in the transformational power of love and compassion, his direct and engaging teaching style encourages others to actively practice their faith and positively influence the world. Ladies and gentlemen, let's give a warm Bible Basics welcome to Minister Eugene Howie. Well, welcome everyone. I'm your host, Jacqui Adewole, and this is the Bible Basics podcast, where, weekly, we break down the Bible into understandable, bite-sized chunks. This week, I am pleased and excited to welcome to our podcast Minister Eugene Howie, a mighty man of God.

Min. Howie: 4:31

Thank you, Jacqui, and I am elated to be here. Thank you so much for the invitation.

Jacqui: 4:39

Absolutely Listeners. This gifted man, a minister, a teacher, a missionary, author yes, I said author, Well, hopefully we'll get into that later and motivational speaker. He's been blessed by God with so many gifts and talents. He has a way of bringing God's Word to life. He engages his audience. He's memorable. He engages them in a fun and even an experiential way, and it's so impactful, it's excellent. It's teaching in excellence. So I count it an honor to have you here, Minister Howie, so welcome again.

Min. Howie: 5:25

The honor is mine to be in front of your audience.

Jacqui: 5:30

As I mentioned, you just have so many gifts and talents I don't even know where we'd start, so I think we should start at the beginning. If you don't mind, would you just give us a little insight about your background and your personal journey to being where you are today?

Min. Howie: 5:49

Sure, honestly, it didn't start out that way. For a very long time there was no indication that it was headed that way. So I grew up in Washington DC. I'm a native Washingtonian, very, very proud native Washingtonian Grew up in the heart of southeast during the time where the crack era was like, right in the middle of the crack era. But I happened to live during the time where, the time before it, and to know what the community was like before crack came in and to see the beauty of it. But I didn't know the beauty of it while I was in it, but when I look back on it it's such a fondness and so it's things that we got used to. So I grew up in an apartment building and so the neighbor would knock on the door and they say they would need some sugar or some salt. And that was just part of the community. That's what we did.

Min. Howie: 6:43

There was a show years ago that they call 227. It was really reminiscent of that type of show where all the mothers sat in a window and they watched everything that went on, and so even if my mother was asleep, somebody's mother was watching. And so in that community, the beauty of it is where my beginning started is where my beginning started. But then growing up and growing through the crack era and then living through all the things that went on during that time, started working and then started just progressing in my work life and so at that time, but there was always this thing in me I could always look at and I could tell you how everybody else was good at something. So all of my friends, these guys were brilliant, they were talented, they were gifted, they were athletic, and I could never see what I had. And so I kind of went through life like, well, that's my gift, seeing how things go together, and, believe it or not, my wife would tell you this. You know, and believe it or not, my wife would tell you I was not a talker, I would not talk to people. That's that's kind of where I began.

Min. Howie: 7:53

And so my journey in faith really began with the invitation A friend of mine invited me to to believe it or not go to First Baptist. He invited me and I never forget this. He invited me and it was still at the ministry center and Pastor Jenkins preached that day God is preparing you to run with the horses, but how can you run with the horses until you contend with your footmen issues. And that day I was compelled to come forward but I didn't, I wouldn't do it, I didn't move. I sat there A few years later when I gave my life to Christ. But I heard it then, but I would not move because I was so embarrassed that people would see me get up and walk down. And so now I can empathize with people where they feel that way. Right, because that was a lack of understanding, because everybody did it at some point in time or another.

Min. Howie: 8:49

But that's where I started and I ended up going to a small church and in that small church it was really traditional, traditional Baptist church. It is reading the hymns out of the red hymn book every day, every Sunday. It's a responsive reading. We had a piano and drums and sometimes we didn't have a piano player all the time, wouldn't have a drummer all the time, and so then you know you're just doing the hand clap and this is like in the 2000s, it's not like is that 1970? No, this is in the 2000s. So, small church, but but foundationally, things about like, why do we, why do we believe what we believe Really, understanding the significance of hymns, understanding the significance of study.

Min. Howie: 9:39

I really feel like I got a doctorate level teaching in that small church, felt like I got a doctorate level teaching in that small church. My mentor and pastor at that time he was a proponent of making sure that you studied and that you knew well. I mean, we did things like book reports to make sure that we would study different books. We did three or four different discipleships where you lead discipleships. So I had a very diverse background. So coming from Southeast Washington DC to then now growing in the faith in Clinton, Maryland, and moving through the diaconate, so I became a deacon, an ordained deacon, a licensed minister, I think I did men's Bible study, I taught Bible study, I taught discipleship as well as community outreach minister, minister to men and missionary. So that's kind of that's kind of like my background. So that's where all these things come from.

Jacqui: 10:37

Wow, that's beautiful, minister. You umm. I'm just thinking about you growing up in Southeast and that I'm picturing that 227 kind of setting where it's a community. That's a true picture of community, where people looked out for each other, where people gave each other, they could borrow salt and sugar from whoever looked out for the kids even though later things took over. But you started out in that kind of a community setting and then talking about getting the bulk of your education that powerful education in a small church again community. So can you talk a little bit about the value of community when it comes to study?

Min. Howie: 11:23

There are some different components. Just as in everyday life and even in our studying of the Word, community helps to bring our study to life, and so it is the place where our faith meets feet. So, when we're living in a community, there are things that we read, there are things that we study, that we can put into practice in the community that we're in, because the community represents so many things. The community represents a belonging, a knowing, a certain amount of safety, and so in all of those things, so you can, what you have learned from, what you have learned from the word, you have a now, a safe place to put in practice, to try and even to share, and that's the, that's the beauty of the community, and by that, community causes other people to grow. One of the things they say, one of the things that I think scientists say, one of the most important things you can do for your child is about deciding where you live, in other words, community. Community is so important into the life and the life and the growth of an individual, and so is it in your faith, because that's the place. That's the place in community. Community, first, is where you'll practice forgiveness, because those are the people in the community and most time the first people who causes the infractions where you would even need forgiveness in the first place. So community is paramount, but don't just trust me right, if we look at the word right, it says Jesus essentially was the word made flesh, that he became flesh and dwelt among us. What does that mean? That means that he went from being in the community with God and the Holy Spirit to move to the community of man. And so what did he do? One of the first things he started to do was develop his more closely knit community. We call them disciples, but they were his community unity, right, and it was in there where he shared his life, his living, his food, his teachings in his community, and so all of these, it's paramount. It is paramount but it is biblical, it is right in sight.

Min. Howie: 13:51

If you look in Acts, the 20th chapter, and you see Paul as Paul is getting ready to leave, and there's this beautiful scene there as Paul is getting ready to leave and Paul tells him. He says look you guys, you have seen me work among you and the food and all this stuff that I've gotten You've seen me do it with my own two hands. So I have lived among you, I have worked among you, I provide for myself and others. Right and essentially saying it's time for him to go. And he said well, as the Bible says, as Paul was leaving, they hugged his neck and they wept and they walked him to the boat.

Min. Howie: 14:27

Because Paul, teacher, preacher, was a part of a community, was a part of a community. His letters, epistles, they are his writings to the community, the community of faith. So community is in your study, your study, and your community helps you get understanding, it helps to challenge you, to grow, but it also gives you revelation because, as you are in your community of faith with other people, you get things that they may have learned and they get things that you may have learned, and so you start to have these things in common and so there's a way if you kind of play with words like common unity is really community.

Jacqui: 15:20

Excellent, excellent. I love that.

Min. Howie: 15:23

And if I could add to that, when we read the Great Commission and the Great Commission tells us to go, but the actual reading of it basically says as you go, and so the church is not so much as the building Now we gather that we may strengthen and may edify one another but also, wherever you are, you are the church. So it is almost like the church is a pop-up. So wherever you pop up, the church has popped up too, and so you now can create the community of faith, whether you're in the grocery store, because that's what it means. This means as you go, as you go amongst your family.

Min. Howie: 16:11

These are interesting things that when we're talking about community, that we look at it as different places, but we have communities everywhere we go, and that's at work, that's a work community, right, and while there may be restrictions on what you may be able to say in terms of or pulling out your Bible chapter and verse, but the word says your word have I hid in my heart, and there is no restriction on what you've hid in your heart that you pour out to the people, so that if you crack open your life and there's word. And so that's the importance of study. The study is so that the word gets down in your heart and as you crack open your life it can't help but to spill over onto people, and maybe it don't say chapter and verse, but they can feel love thy neighbor as thyself. Maybe they can feel all of those things you know. So I think that's the kind of important way we can look at community as well it's an excellent approach to looking at community.

Jacqui: 17:20

I love that. I love that, no matter where we go, we are the community or we can have community. Yes, now on this topic of study, everyone I talk to has um insights, different approaches, different techniques, different ways that they study God's Word or that they teach other people to study it, and so I want to just encourage you to share with us your ideas or your approaches when it comes to actually studying.

Min. Howie: 17:58

Study is how I really begin to take in, like, like food. It becomes the nutrients it feeds me on a cellular level, right. It gives me what I need to be able, just like food, to manage in the day to day world. And so and so when I'm looking at what I study, I look at it from that particular standpoint, like what does this give me? Or if it doesn't necessarily give me something at this season that I know I can hold it, because I know there'll be a season of life that I may need this. I may not even understand why I got this at this particular time, but I know that if it's not for me, it's for somebody, and so you know so. So I look at it, it's like it's a necessity, it's like breathing, it's like water, it's like eating, it is all of these things, and so and you hear all of those different iterations that talk about the word in that way, you know, and so that's, and that's what it means to me, it is life. That's essentially it says when Jesus says you know, I'm the way, I'm the truth, I am the life. The word for that word, life there in the Greek is the word zoe, right, and that word means zoe, means that I am everything that's necessary and essential, and so, and that's what it is, and so understanding that when you're reading the word, when you're studying it, you're studying everything that's necessary and essential If I just pause for a moment, that kind of implicates everything else that we study, because if Jesus says that he is everything that's necessary and essential, then it almost says that everything else is not necessary and not essential. So but and I think and I think you were kind of leading to if you were asking about a process, right, and so so it's necessary, it's essential, and so that for that there's a process. And so if we had the, the words, there's a, there's a word that's called prowess, right, p-r-o-w-e-s-s. And so that is the way in which I look at study, that's my, that's how I study, work out my study, and so it starts with prayer, right. So the P is for prayer, so it's an acrostic, it is. So P is prayer, because that's where you want to start, right. And so the prayer is the beginning, but it's also a beginning of the process of listening. So when I speak a prayer, I don't talk about just prayer and just saying, hey, god, I need this, I need this, I need this, I need this, but it is petitioning and listening, and so that is prayer. So we start with prayer.

Min. Howie: 21:09

The next thing is in the study is reading, right, so you pray, then you read. Now, there's some things that I do that's a bit different, but so I will read it. Then I'll read it out loud, right, because if there is there is, there is something about hearing yourself say the word to you. There's something about hearing yourself say the word to you. So you pray, you, you read out loud, Right. And so then the other part, and I have my my, my P, my R, my O.

Min. Howie: 21:44

So when I read out loud, that does, that gives me this, it gives me this chance to give voice to things that may not normally have voicings, you know.

Min. Howie: 21:54

And so if you just read, so the word became flesh and he dwelt among. But when you begin to read it fully out, and the word became flesh and he dwelt among, it's very different, right, and so we start to move, we start moving along. So that's reading, reading out loud, right. And so when we start to really get down into those things that I do in terms of I give things different voices, right, because I look at you know. So the O is like I give things voices, but before I can give it a voice, I must observe, right, so I'm doing an observation, so I observe all the all the little things, right, what does this mean? And so some of the tools that you may need and I know some of the tools that you may need when you're, when you're studying get you a marker, highlighter, pen and circle stuff, write big, you know, write big on your Bible, it's OK, you know. And so that you that, when you see things and you're making an observation, because you can ask questions like hey, what does that mean?

Min. Howie: 22:59

And so when you pray, you read out loud, you start to observe and you start to take note of these different things that are happening in the text, the different movements, the different nuances, the different people.

Min. Howie: 23:14

Then I do, I question, I question, right, so the W, I start asking why, why did they say this? Why did they do that? Why did they put that there? What is happening here? Wait, let me go back right. And so, and I know we'll get to that, but you know, and that's why context becomes important, because when you start asking the questions like wait, wait, what, what happened here? Now you know. And so when you start to really look, and so you pray, you read out loud, you observe, and you do the. You know, they do the. They call them five W's, but you know, you question it. So it's, you know what's happening, what's what's really going on, why is it going on? You know, and so you start to. And so then you experiment, right, like seeing how does this particular thing work somewhere else, right, like, well, how does, if someone did this, how does this forgiveness thing work? If this happens, how does this? And so you experiment, because all of these different processes takes your study to bringing your study to life. Right, you start to you know, and so once you start to experiment, you can now start to survey to see how these principles start to survey, to see how these principles, these things that you've seen in the text that you're experimenting with, what is it like to say to somebody? And there's things that I do because sometimes you can turn things around. So, while it's important that we forgive other people most of the time, we look at oh, I forgive them for what they did to you, but sometimes you turn it around and take the blame and tell them listen, please forgive me, even when you're not the person who did the thing that you perceive to be wrong. Turn that around and watch that experiment and then survey and see how that has an impact. And so once I survey, I do, I look at the text and one of the things I'll do is I'll give them shoes, right? So a lot of times, when they're when they're when they're different people in the text, I want to, I want to, I want to give them shoes. I want to give them shoes because the word prowess that S. It's really three S's the way that I spell it, because I'm going to give them shoes, because everybody has shoes.

Min. Howie: 25:39

When you come into a text, if you have the disciples, you've got different shoes. So you've got Peter's shoes right there, you've got Jesus' shoes right there and you've got all the other disciples' shoes. But then you have the crowd, the people who are watching. They have shoes too. And so once you can start to give people shoes, the text takes on a different meaning depending on the shoes you're standing.

Min. Howie: 26:05

And so now when I start to say okay, I look from his shoes. So now when I start to see it from other shoes, so how do I see what Jesus says to Peter from different shoes? You see, if Jesus says lovest thou me, peter, how do I see what Jesus is saying to Peter from Peter's shoes? How do I see it from the shoes of somebody else that's standing there watching that says they're making up their mind? Oh, my goodness. I mean Jesus is challenging him to see if Peter really loves him. That's somebody's shoes who don't know the backstory about Peter, right? And so Peter is confused as to why Jesus is asking this question. Like you know, I love you. So Peter's not sure why he's asking, but Jesus knows that he's asking him that he might restore him.

Min. Howie: 26:59

And that takes your study to a very different level to understand that sometimes there can be things happening and everybody that may be a part, may have seen it but may not have understand what they've seen. And even though they're in it, may not understand what's happening. But you got to sometimes now, if you said well, you know what, let me look at it from another set of shoes. So when you're looking at the text and you're reading, you're studying the Bible. So when you're looking at the text and you're reading, you're studying the Bible.

Min. Howie: 27:36

Think about the shoes and think about how to see it from their shoes. How do they feel? How do women feel in a male-dominated culture, right, when men are making these rules? How do the women feel? What is it like for a man now to be studying, to put his self in the shoes of the woman, to be like, wait a minute. That was me, I would, wow, Wait a minute. So it's prowess, it's P-R-O-W-E-S-S-S.

Min. Howie: 28:12

So we pray, we read out loud, we question, we do the what, the where, the, why. You know. We experiment, you know. So we do all of those things right. We give them shoes, you know. So we can see from their shoes, and that's a lot of times. If you're seeing me go through things and I do I give them full voicings. If I'm going to talk from their perspective, I give them full voicings. And my wife may think that it's multiple people living in this house, but I will give them full out voicings because when you start to see them, it comes alive to you, because that's really where it matters. It's when the Bible comes to life.

Jacqui: 29:02

When the Bible comes to life. Wow, that was so very enlightening, but there's more. Join us next week for part two, where we'll learn about Minister Howie's book. We'll talk about how to handle hard scriptures and find out how he used the Bible to make me laugh uncontrollably. Thanks for joining in, or you can click on the share button right where you're listening now. For those of you listening on YouTube, go ahead and like, subscribe and leave us a comment In closing. May the grace and peace of God be with you now and always. You.