It was the 20th century author and playwright George Bernard Shaw, who opined, “No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says: He is always convinced that it says what he means.” Ouch! That smarts! Yet as prickly and hyperbolic this generalization is, we do well to sit with it for a while, for perhaps we’ve been influenced by those who have distorted God’s words into something different than what He said and meant. Or maybe, just maybe we’ve twisted them ourselves. Bending the Word to our comfort level or subjecting it to flawed human judgment is not new; it is as ancient as one cataclysmic encounter in the Garden of Eden. “Did God really say . . . ?”1
In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul reminded them, “I . . . did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”2 The apostle’s teaching “[did] not go beyond what is written,”3 and he taught his hearers to follow his example. Yet in his follow-up Corinthian correspondence, Paul apparently felt compelled to reiterate the matter: “We . . . do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God.”4 Apparently, others had, for in his farewell letter to the Church, Peter noted, “There are some things in [Paul’s letters] that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.”5 It is a dire condition, our weak-kneed tendency to conform God’s Word to the ways and wiles of man or to subordinate it to fickle human judgment. To the contrary, ours is to incline our heart to His ways, to subject our will to His authority, and to comport our understanding to His wisdom. “Thy Word is truth.”6
Paul warned his understudy, Timothy, “The time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.”7 So it has been, and so it continues. Paul’s exhortation to Timothy, then, is equally timeless: “Study to [show] thyself approved unto God, a workman that [need] not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”8 This is our call; this is God’s will for us. So, pray that the Spirit of God speak daily through the Word of God. Consider the context into which Scripture is spoken, yet recognize also that some truth spoken into context is timeless in application. Learn from trusted teachers. And rejoice freely and securely in the flawless Word of God.
“Every word of God proves true.”9 Yes, Father, this is our confession. Send Your Spirit to lead us away from falsehood and into the light of truth. In Christ we pray. Amen.
1 Genesis 3:1 NIV
2 1 Corinthians 2:1-2 ESV
3 1 Corinthains 4:6 ESV
4 2 Corinthians 4:2 NIV
5 2 Peter 3:16 ESV
6 John 17:17 KJV
7 2 Timothy 4:3-4 ESV
8 2 Timothy 2:15 KJV
9 Proverbs 30:5 ESV
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Paul Nordman—Author 