How can I know if I am truly discerning the Bible properly?

"How can I know if I am truly discerning the Bible properly?

 1) "Let us discern for ourselves what is right; let us learn together what is good." Job 34:4 Your standard of morality and law will be God Himself. The Holy Spirit will aid in wisdom in weighing cases. This includes learning God's character, learning the rules of logic, studying God's moral laws, and meditating on the wisdom and advice found in scripture (proverbs, James, Ecclesiastes, etc). 

2)"And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in true knowledge and discernment, so that you may be able to test what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God." Phillipians 1:9-10 As we love God and our brethren and neighbors we will grow in true knowledge (relational knowledge with others, especially Christ). It is this true knowledge we gain as we love while abiding in Christ and partaking with the church that gives us discernment (vs. Simple head knowledge which leads to a fractured church, not a unified one). We then, from this spirit of unity and love, can test for what is best and ideal that the church as a whole may be blameless until Christ returns. Our goal is the love and growth of the church.

 3) Pray for discernment and understanding (1 Kings 3:9-11). These allow us to effectually use our gifts, and to distinguish between right and wrong.

 4) Use/practice what you know to be good. "But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil." Hebrews 5:14

 5) Don't quarrel on trifling matters, avoid godless chatter, and do not listen to those you know to be false teachers. (II Timothy 2:14-19)

 6) Cut secret sins from your life, repent of hypocrisy, and do not deliberately deceive with or distort the word of God. Use it as plainly as you can, and this in turn will strengthen your own discernment and understanding. (II Cor 4:1-2)

 7) Get into the practice of examining what you hear from teachers, books, and speakers and testing it against the word of God. (1 John 4:1, 1 Thess 5:19-22, Acts 17:11)

 8) Scripture leads back to Christ. (John 5:39). This may seem pretty basic, but there are many books and teachings out there proposing new ideas or 'lost' methods of study. The first litmus test is always if the teaching magnifies Christ throughout, or magnifies its new teaching throughout with Christ as an incidental.

In summary: Love God and others, repent of sin, study the word, test what you hear and read against scripture, study general common sense and the rules of logic, pray/lean on God/ask for wisdom in all decision making, avoid trivial disputes, use the word as clearly as you personally can. While there will be times where you clearly know the Holy Spirit just gave you an answer or alerted you to something wrong, in general the Holy Spirit works by repeating to you the words of Christ, or by giving understanding, or by giving giving grace for spiritual growth. You will know you are discerning correctly not primarily by any feeling, but by how well what you have discerned reflects Christ and is harmonious with the Word of God.