Thou shalt not take passages in isolation.
In the winter of 1980, TV stations showed a demonstrator picketing mass murderer Stephen Judy's prison with a sign that said, ``Thou Shalt Not Kill'' to protest his execution. To refresh your memory, Judy tricked a kind-hearted woman into stopping to help him with faked car trouble. He raped and murdered her in front of her three small children, then held each child under water until they drowned. This was only the last of his many sex crimes. He was never the least bit sorry.
The picketers made the mistake of taking passages in isolation. They ignored Genesis 9:6, ``Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed,'' the fact that ``a man after God's own heart'' killed Goliath, and St. Paul's agreement that some sins are worthy of death, Acts 25:11. We are even commanded to support governments that ``bear the sword,'' Romans 13:4. They are called ``servants of God.'' Roman swords were not very useful as billy clubs. Their main use was in stabbing. Case closed.
To understand a doctrine, collect all the passages that speak about it. Just read through the Bible and write them down. Then you can organize them in the proper order. If you don't have the time, sell your TV. If you don't have the ability, then spend a few bucks on the book that has already done most of the work for you. Luther's Catechism has gathered all the passages on all the chief doctrines of Scripture, stirred them together, and boiled them down to their essence. In my seminary library there were, at last count, some 30,000 books to help us understand the Bible. All of them put together are not worth as much as the Small Catechism. Far better than all other religious books, the Catechism gives a balanced presentation of Scripture. Each doctrine is presented there in just the right order exactly its proper weight and emphasis as found in the Bible. Lutherans don't use Luther's Catechism because it is Luther's. We use it because it's the best.