Hey folks,
I’m thrilled to be able to welcome Zach to the Odds and Enns family and share an excerpt from his new book "Better Ways to Read the Bible" that releases tomorrow. Please enjoy (and also go buy his book)!
___________________________________________________________________________
Better Ways to Read the Bible:
“When I look back at the parade of expulsions that was my formative years, I realize that questioning prevailing Bible interpretations got me kicked out of a Christian school in fourth grade, a youth group in seventh grade, and a Christian denomination (or two) as an adult.
I think the religious leaders in those spaces thought that kicking me out would somehow shut down my questions, that I would be put in my place and finally understand the danger of those questions, but instead they were magnified. They weighed on me. My unanswered questions hung heavy around my neck as if someone had chained dumbbells together and forced me to carry them everywhere I went.
How can a loving God call for the murder of every man, woman, child, and animal in a city like Jericho? How can a merciful God sentence the vast majority of humans—many of whom have never even heard the name of Jesus—to eternal conscious torment in the fires of hell? How can a good God tell slaves to obey their masters? How can a just God prescribe a life of subjugation for women simply because of their gender? How can a gracious God perpetrate genocide by sending a flood to drown every human on earth except for one family? How can a kind God call my LGBTQ+ loved ones an abomination?
I tried to find answers to these questions by reading the Bible the way I’d been taught, but it didn’t work. No amount of quiet times could quiet my doubts. No amount of church connections could mend my ever-increasing spiritual disconnection.
Peter Enns gives words to my experience when he writes, “The spiritual disconnection many feel today stems precisely from expecting (or being told to expect) the Bible to be holy, perfect, and clear, when in fact after reading it they find it to be morally suspect, out of touch, confusing, and just plain weird.”
I was told to read the Bible for inspiration and spiritual nourishment. “It’s like food for your soul,” I once heard a pastor say. “If you don’t eat, your body breaks down. If you don’t read your Bible, your soul breaks down.”
But it was often the stuff I read in the Bible that broke down my soul. When I read it looking for answers, I emerged with more questions. When I searched it for inspiration, I came away feeling discouraged.
I felt like many of my experiences with Scripture were leading me away from the Jesus whose love changed my life and toward a cruel and capricious God who terrified me.”
—-----———————————————————————————————————
I was raised in a Southern Baptist megachurch. I was taught that the bible was the sole source of truth in the world, the answer for all of my questions, and God’s personalized love letter written directly to me. I often joke now that the churches of my youth believed the Trinity consisted of “Father, Son, and Holy Bible,” but it really is true. The Scriptures were treated as divine.
So when I, a rowdy and, as my wife likes to say, “spirited” child, began to have serious questions about the Bible, they were attributed to my bad behavior and penchant for mischief. Persistent in my frustration with the irreconcilable nature of seeming contradictions in scripture, my questions increased, and so did my volume. By the time I was thirteen, I had had enough.
As I mention in the book, I was kicked out of my youth group for asking too many questions and causing other students to “question their faith.” I was thankful– my parents couldn’t make me go if the youth pastor wouldn’t allow it. Besides, who would want to be a part of a group where genuine, intelligent questions were disparaged?
The problem with this lack of individual thought (and lack of value for individuals) is this (among other things): we all come to scripture with a set of lenses, colored by our experiences and our beliefs. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying. We cannot somehow step outside of ourselves in order to read scripture without bias.
So what’s the point of perpetuating this theory? As Pete recently stated in a series of notes on inerrancy, “In my experience, many who hold strongly to inerrancy do so in large part due to the social pressure of the community they inhabit. I understand that pressure, especially if one works in powerful institutions that supply your paycheck. As I mentioned in my 2nd point, smart people who believe in inerrancy do so not because their intellectual faculties led them there, but by being clever enough to construct arguments that allow them to stay within those boundaries.”
I now know that I actually was causing problems for my youth pastor, problems that he had no interest in addressing with integrity or compassion. He didn’t know the answers either, but he didn’t care. Instead of answering my questions, he made an example of me, showing everyone else that questioning leads to shunning.
If a homogenous group of people can peg one wayward member as problematic, then the questions don’t ever have to be answered– the wayward member is simply pushed out for their deviance and everyone else keeps their thoughts to themselves. But what is the result of this method? It isn’t a church where people are learning and growing together; it’s a cult-like community that values obedience and assimilation above all.
Is this what Jesus dreamed of in his hope for abundance and flourishing for all? I don’t think so. If we are allowing the spirit to lead, to renew our minds and grow in our understanding, then we must trust that the spirit can take us somewhere beyond the bounds of one interpretation of the very diverse and expansive set of writings known as the bible. And in order to do that, we must identify the lenses through which we are studying scripture.
Better Ways to Read the Bible attempts to do that– identify harmful lenses through which we may be viewing scripture (possibly without even realizing it)-- and replace them with a framework which encourages more authentic interaction with God’s word. I pray that it will be a valuable resource to anyone and everyone who needs some encouragement in their attempts to read the bible. Many of us have been hurt by pastors and people– either unintentionally or very intentionally– who used scripture to demand specific behavior. But the bible is so much bigger and more beautiful than a rule book or a country club manual.
Whether you have struggled with the Bible or just want to read it for all its worth, I believe this book will benefit you. I pray it does.