Reddit mentions of Bible Doctrine: Essential Teachings of the Christian Faith

1. YouVersion has some great Bible reading plans. I would suggest McCheyne's
   
2. A great companion for reading in a McCheyne plan is D.A. Carson's For the Love of God Part 1 Part 2
   
3. One of the best pieces of advice I can give you as you read scripture is to look at the big picture. Try to see where the passage you are reading fits into the grand storyline of the Bible.
   
4. May I also suggest picking up a book that will cover Bible doctrines? It's really helpful to have a grasp on what the Bible says about God and how He interacts with His creation. On the layman's level I would suggest Christian Beliefs by Wayne Grudem. If you feel like going a little deeper, check out Grudem's bigger book Bible Doctrine. If you feel like really digging in, go with Grudem's massive Systematic Theology, which I believe is the most readable systematic theology available.
   
5. I'm a Baptist so I think getting rebaptized is great, assuming you are a genuine believer at this point, which I have no cause to doubt. In fact, if I was being a cranky Baptist I would tell you you're not getting rebaptized, you were just a wet sinner the first time. However, I'm only occasionally a cranky Baptist, and have nothing against my paedobaptist brothers (other than thinking they're wrong on this one).
   
6. Get into a good church. I know you mentioned you're following Christ and not a church, but the local church is one of the primary means of doing so. Maybe you already have done this, and I am misinterpreting what you were trying to say. Lone ranger Christians are unhealthy Christians. If you are looking for a good church check with 9Marks and The Gospel Coalition.
   
   I hope this helps.
   
   edit: spelling

Bible Doctrine is an easier and shorter version of Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology. You could also go for the full version. It's very popular.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0310222338

Honestly Bible Doctrine is one of the easiest Systematics to understand. (I might be a bit biased since Jeff Purswell is our dean of our Pastors College and I have great affection for the man.)

EDIT: Bonus: John Frame's Systematic is also pretty readable.

Well, I actually grew up in the Pentecostal tradition. I converted to Southern Baptist about two years ago, and made the switch to reformed theology about one year ago.

It really depends on the church with Baptists; they're highly variable. Some groups, like free-will baptists, are emphatically opposed to Calvin and the like. Others, like self-proclaimed reformed baptists, welcome and celebrate Calvin and his contemporaries' contributions to Protestantism. I've never attended a baptist church that wasn't at least implicitly Calvinist, though I only recently started attending a properly reformed Church that observed the 2nd London Baptist Confession. Hence, it's kind of difficult to give much advice, as I've always been in friendly territory.

If you just want to get a better feel for reformed theology in-general, there are a couple of routes. Depending on your reading comprehension and Biblical competence, I would recommend a few books.

Novice: Bible Doctrine, Grudem.

This is a decent, modern introduction to systematic theology in-general. Grudem is not what many would call reformed, but he leans that way. Whatever the case, it is a helpful look into the terminology that theologians have utilized over the years. Good place to get your feet wet.

Adept: Systematic Theology, Grudem

Reformed Dogmatics, Bavinck

These ones are a bit more academically oriented, so if you're not used to reading this sort of thing, they might be difficult to read. Bavinck's work is highly recommended, and is properly reformed, though it takes a greater reading comprehension than Grudem.

Advanced: Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin

Anything else earlier than the 20th Century (Jonathan Edwards, John Owen, etc.)

This is the bedrock of reformed theology, which I'm sure you're probably aware of. The only problem is that it can be very difficult to read. In some cases, much more than the content of modern academia. This is really a very very distilled list. There is literally so much good material out there, but these are some of the big names that I hear often.

As regards general advice, two things come to mind:

1. I would keep in mind the primacy of the text of Scripture itself. This might seem obvious, but one of the pitfalls of the reformation is the romance with systematic theology. Though ST is a wonderful thing, some reformed guys do it at the expense of the textual significance of the Scriptures themselves. We must always ask ourselves if we, in our exposition, are doing justice to what the Scriptures themselves are saying. Again, this seems obvious, but it is rarely borne out the praxis of our theology and exegesis.
   
   
2. Do not make Calvinism or Reformed theology the locus of your Christianity or your identity. Though reformed soteriology is seminal to our faith and practice, we must ultimately identify ourselves as the covenant people of God; those united to Christ through faith in His death and resurrection. Rest in the substance of your faith, not in its explanation.
   
   I'll be praying that you heed the Scriptures in all things, and that your life coheres with the will of God. Feel free to PM me if you have any specific questions or concerns as relates the reformation, theology, Scripture, or anything!
   
   Soli deo Gloria

I'm taking this out of my copy of Bible Doctrine:


Out of all the creatures God made, only one creature, man, is said to be made "in the image of God."

What does that mean?

We may use the following definition: The fact that man is in the image of God means that man is like God and represents God.

When God says, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness" (Gen 1:26), the meaning is that God plans to make a creature similar to himself. Both the Hebrew word for "image" (tselem) and the Hebrew word for "likeness" (demut) refer to something that is simlar but not identical to the thing it represents or is an "image" of. The word image can also be used of something that represents something else.

...

Which leads us to the fall, which distorts God's image on us but not completely.


There's more to all this, if you want me to type it up as well.

Actually that's "Bible Doctrine" and "Christian Beliefs" is the concise version of that. In other words, it's the condensed condensed Systematic Theology

Grudem teaches with care for Christ and the Word, and it comes off as more than just a cold exegesis. I would recommend his "Bible Doctrine" if you don't want to delve into the big bad boy thick textbook that SysTheo is. It's a concise, shorter version of the same book.

http://www.amazon.com/Bible-Doctrine-Wayne-Grudem/dp/0310222338/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1319825069&sr=8-1