The tragedy of (Bible) illiteracy

How progressive Christianity, Christian nationalism, and the "Transformed Wife" don't know their Bibles

Having joined a few online Christian groups, I’ve become painfully aware of the magnitude of biblical illiteracy among those who claim Christ.

Some of this may well be social media trolls joining groups like this to mock and divide. Who’s to know, when it’s all online?

To be clear, I’m not assuming that anyone who expresses unbiblical ideas (while presenting them as biblical) is a troll, a heretic, or even still lost. I’m afraid that most of them are sincerely seeking to follow Jesus, but in a world of increasingly false teaching – and a world decreasingly able to think critically, much less biblically – this is inevitable.

The trap that snares many is one of the devil’s favorites. He’s been pushing verses out of context since the beginning, like he tried with Jesus in the wilderness:

And he led Him to Jerusalem and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down from here, for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning You to guard You,’ and, ‘On their hands they will bear You up, lest You strike Your foot against a stone.’”

And Jesus answered and said to him, “It is said, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” – Luke 4:9-12

Note the correct response for those taking verses out of context is answering with the whole counsel of Scripture.

Of course Jesus had a better grasp of that than we can ever have, but once we are adopted into His family at salvation, our most important tasks are to know Him and make Him known. And it’s hard to make Him known if we don’t know Him very well. And there’s only one way to know Him better — and that’s to know what He is saying to us.

You see where I’m going with this. Every Christian must prioritize time in the Word, every day of his or her life:

• Pray. Ask the Holy Spirit to illuminate His Word to you.

• Read. You don’t have to read it through in a year, and you don’t have to start in Genesis and end in Revelation. But you need to read through it all, as often as you can in your lifetime, however fast or slow you go. Over and over again. (Here’s a great site for choosing or crafting your own Bible reading plan.)

• Meditate. Not some woo–woo empty your mind stuff, but by filling your mind with God’s thoughts (aka, Bible verses/passages).

• Memorize. Always have something you’re memorizing. Regularly review passages you’ve already memorized.

• Listen. Listen to good preaching, ideally in a church that teaches through books of the Bible expositionally, verse by verse.

• Study. Dig deep in a passage or book. Dig deeper into the book your pastor is teaching. Or, pick a book to study on your own. Use time-tested commentaries and supplemental materials – you can even read or listen to sermons on the book in question. A few good sources for materials, sermons or studies are Grace To You and Ligonier Ministries. Ask your pastor questions about what you’re studying.

• Consider others’ perspectives. This is kind of the extra-credit section, but since we have 2000 years of thoughtful commentary on God’s Word, it is valuable to consider what others have said about a passage, or how they’ve applied it.

This all requires organizing your life so that this can be a priority. No matter what season of life you’re in, you want to make room for some of this every single day. If you’re single or an empty nester, you may well be able to carve out more time.

But even busy parents need this to anchor everything – and let your kids see you or at least know you’re having this time, because it’s a powerful model. As soon as they’re old enough to understand, they can have their time with God while you do.

What do we get when we don’t prioritize this?

Well, we get what we have today in “Christianity”:

People quoting lots of verses about loving and being kind, but none about speaking truth or confronting sin

With a vague idea that Jesus was just all about warm fuzzies and rainbows, these folks argue in favor of allowing the mutilation of young people confused by a world of deception regarding their identity. Or they argue that people have a right to break immigration laws, and you are not being like Jesus if you disagree.

So-called Christian progressives never met a sin they couldn’t justify simply by telling us to “love like Jesus” – while utterly ignoring the truths He taught (sometimes somewhat harshly – consider Matthew 23 for one example). They don’t teach or know Scripture’s full picture of Jesus.

People quoting verses without context

One of the most common mistakes. Let’s pull an example from the other side of the political spectrum – the Christian Nationalists. These folks have no scriptural support for their contention that our job as believers is to literally take power and impose a Christian nation on everyone else. As I said in an earlier post:

The hardcore Christian Nationalists are misinterpreting the Great Commission – they see it as a mandate to “Christianize” society through politics. Get laws and policies and cultural movements to reflect the Bible, get the women to stay home (this is a pretty big part of their thinking), and the world will be a better place. Here one of their more prominent leaders discusses forcibly taking away property from churches that aren’t teaching the Bible correctly.

I have had self-proclaimed Christian Nationalists tell me that Matthew 28:19-20 (the Great Commission) proves they are on the right track, because it says:

Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to keep all that I commanded you; and behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

See, they tell me. We are to go and make disciples of each nation, so why not start with our own?

And this is an outstanding example of ignoring every contextual clue (not to mention just about everyone’s interpretation of this command for the last couple thousand years). In this case, context was provided immediately within the same verse, so ignoring it really takes some effort.

“Make disciples of all the nations” has always been understood to mean “make disciples from all the nations” BECAUSE the rest of that verse says “baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” – so, their argument that Christians’ mission is to “make disciples of nations” falls apart since not only can you not force a whole nation to be a disciple of Jesus, but neither can you baptize a nation.

Of course you don’t have to be deluded by Christian Nationalism to ignore context. Anytime you want to twist Scripture to your preconceived ideas, you ignore context. For instance, Catholics have told me that their doctrine that Mary is “Queen of Heaven” is biblical, and one such gentleman quoted 1 Kings 2:19 as proof. Let’s see how it argues for Mary being Queen of Heaven:

So Bathsheba went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adonijah. And the king arose to meet her, bowed before her, and sat on his throne; then he had a throne set for the king’s mother, and she sat on his right.

Hmmm. I’m not getting, from this passage, that Mary is the Queen of Heaven, or was a sinless perpetual virgin that we can pray to.

I’m not getting that because it’s not here.

The context is that 1 Kings is part of Old Testament Jewish history. Here, the king’s mother wished to speak to him on a matter, and he showed her respect. There is no secret message here; the Spirit-inspired author (possibly the prophet Jeremiah) was simply recording history. This has nothing to do with Mary, nor does anything else in the Bible point to this false doctrine. (If you’re Catholic, I respectfully request you consider these arguments here regarding Mary.)

And speaking of the Old Testament… a (sadly) common mistake is insisting we as Christians must follow Old Testament law. The Hebrew Roots movement does this, and its followers generally criticize anyone who celebrates Christmas or Easter but not the Old Testament feasts. They are lacking the context of much New Testament teaching, which clarifies we are under not law but grace. The entire book of Galatians was written to call out this ungodly legalism.

People adding their own “gospel” to the Bible

The Bible repeatedly tells us not to add to God’s Word (or His words, if you will) – see Proverbs 30:5-6 for just one example of this. But a lot of bad teaching happens when people disobey this teaching and layer on their own faulty ideas.

Lori Alexander, a woman calling herself The Transformed Wife, claims to teach younger women their biblical roles. However, she inserts a lot of her own twisted ideas, many of which reflect a very poor understanding of wise biblical counsel.

Ephesians 5:22 says a woman is to submit to her husband. Of course, the context is that the verse immediately preceding this says that as Christians we are to submit to each other. And there are multiple verses after 5:22 that outline how a man is to treat his wife, loving her and giving himself up for her.

Likewise, 1 Timothy 2:12 refers to women not teaching or exercising authority over men in church.

Some people struggle with these scriptures, but in no way do they indicate that a woman cannot speak out against falsehood. This is purely Lori Alexander’s opinion, that this somehow constitutes “ugly” behavior.

This is hardly the most outrageous thing she’s ever said – she counsels women, for example, to just be quiet and pray if they find out their husbands are into porn. She recommends the unscriptural child rearing advice of a widely-discredited couple, Michael and Debi Pearl. She’s worthy of an article all about her; maybe a topic for another day.

But here’s another example of her unscriptural opinions:

This is in fact the most important command for females, according to Lori. Not love the Lord, or love your neighbor as yourself. Nope, ladies, if you’re not having children you’re really missing the mark.

This is false teaching. There are plenty of scriptures that relate specifically to single believers, and none of them counsel that women need to all be having children. Lori doesn’t seem to even consider that God calls some to singleness, or that some women can’t conceive. It’s sad that her grandchild thinks that’s God’s most important commandment.

Never read a Bible verse

The outstanding organization Stand to Reason, dedicated to helping Christians think clearly, offers an excellent way to think of “whole Bible counsel.” Greg Koukl’s article “Never Read a Bible Verse” provides practical ways to avoid some of the types of errors catalogued above. I think it should be required reading for every believer! Read it here.

And let’s strive to take as big of a “whole Bible” approach as possible, always. Here’s to eradicating (biblical) illiteracy!