Finding Bible Verses
A How-To Guide
Q. I’m in middle school. But, I don’t know how to find verses. Can you tell me how to find Bible verses. Like when my teacher says to turn to Eph. 6:12. But, I don’t understand what I’m supposed to do.
Answer:
Thanks so much for your question. I’ll bet a lot of students and adults don’t understand how to find verses, either. But, many won’t ask because they are too embarrassed to admit they don’t know something. By the way, it just so happens that one of our favorite verses in the New Testament is “Eph. 6:12.”
Example: Finding “Eph. 6:12”
1. First, “Eph.” is a short word for the book of Ephesians. You can find the complete spelling of the book in your Table of Contents or list of books at the beginning of your Bible. The abbreviations look similar to the book. For example, “Pet.” is Peter. “Heb.” is Hebrews. “Rev.” is Revelation, and so on.
2. Then, when you turn to the book of Ephesians the large numbers you see inside the book every few paragraphs or so are the chapters. “Eph. 6” means to turn to Ephesians, chapter six.
3. The smaller number connected to the chapter number (by a colon) is the number of the verse or sentence inside chapter 6. The reference looks like this:
Eph. 6:12. (The number twelve is the verse or sentence number).
4. Finally, when authors quote a verse they usually put the reference at the end like this:
“Our fight is not against human beings. It is against the rulers, the authorities and the powers of this dark world. It is against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly world” (Eph. 6:12, NIrV).
Usually the verse reference is followed by a comma listing the abbreviated spelling of the translation used. Here are some popular versions and their abbreviations:
ESV – English Standard Version
HCSB – Holman Christian Standard Bible
NASB – New American Standard Bible
NIV – New International Version
NIrV – New International reader’s Version
NKJV – New King James Version
NLT – New Living Translation
NRSV – New Revised Standard Version
Now just practice finding some verses and you’ll become as quick as anyone else!