What to do when the Bible offends you: 3 suggestions from Tim Keller
Just a few weeks ago, I had some thoughts on the deconversion of Jon Steingard, the former lead singer of Hawk Nelson. The driving force he cited behind his deconversion was a declining view of Scripture. He came to realize, he says, that the writers of Scripture were flawed like anyone else. Therefore, Scripture itself must be flawed like any other book. As I discussed in my post a couple weeks ago, I don’t think Steingard’s reasoning was very sound here. But there’s no doubt that he’s not the only one. Many, many people walk away from Christ because they take offense at what the Bible says.
If we are taking Scripture seriously, we should all occasionally be offended by something it says. We are sinful human beings who don’t like being told to change our ways. To us, some of the things God commands of us sound downright scandalous! It shouldn’t at all surprise us that our fallen, sinful minds would take offense at the commands and teachings of a holy God.
The process of understanding and obeying Scripture is uncomfortable and, at times, laborious. But if we are to be changed people, then we need to go through it. We need to wrestle with Scripture and face what it truly says, and sometimes that is going to offend us.
This week, I listened to a 2006 sermon by Tim Keller in which he addressed this very topic. You can read the manuscript of the full sermon here. In particular, he recommends that when you encounter something in the Bible that offends you, you should take three things into consideration.
#1. Consider that it might not be teaching what you think it is.
Keller recounts how when he was younger, he was internally scandalized to realize how many of the heroes of the Old Testament practiced polygamy. Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, and others had multiple wives. It never says that God disapproved of it. A surface-level reading might lead one to conclude that God is at least okay with polygamy.
A close examination of the Old Testament, however, shows exactly the opposite. The polygamous relationships of the great heroes of faith were always a mess. Often, they led to considerable suffering. Solomon, who married 700 wives and fell into idolatry, is the most extreme example. If anything, the Old Testament illustrates all the reasons you shouldn’t engage in polygamy.
It’s easy to make this kind of mistake with the literature of the Bible. It’s natural to try and read the Bible like we would read any 21st-century book. We like our books to be direct and clear—to come right out and say what they mean. But the Bible is a collection of ancient literature written by ancient people. They use ancient literary devices in a way that their own audience would understand. Interpreting the deeper intent behind ancient writing is possible, but it takes some work and study.
The Bible is not a bunch of children’s moral tales. It’s not a science or history textbook, and we shouldn’t read it (or teach it) as though it were. Those who are scandalized by Genesis’s description of a six-day creation, the Israelite wars of conquest, or passages that speak of hell as a place of fire and torture should first consider what these passages are actually trying to teach. Perhaps they are an ancient writer’s way of expressing deeper truths. (Or perhaps they do mean what you think they do, and we need to consider one of the next two items.)
#2. Consider that you might be misreading it through “cultural blinders.”
Keller cites an acutely relevant example to our time: slavery. The Old Testament law permitted and regulated slavery, and the New Testament tells slaves to submit to their masters. In our not-too-distant history, American enslavers used the Bible to justify their actions. So does this mean the Bible is pro-slavery?
If we take off our cultural blinders, we will get a different picture than the one we are thinking of. We can learn how different the slavery practiced by the Israelites was from the slavery of our American heritage. Israelite slaves were more comparable to “indentured servants”—those who have to work off a debt for a set amount of time and then are set free.
Does that mean God was okay with slavery, or that some kinds of slavery are okay? No. But, as Jesus said, God permitted the Israelites to do some things that were fundamentally wrong because of their hard hearts (Matthew 19:8-9). In the New Testament, we can see a big-picture theology that undermines the basis for slavery by proclaiming the fundamental equality of every human as an image-bearer of God. We also see that, though Paul doesn’t explicitly condemn slavery, he does condemn “slave traders” (1 Timothy 1:10, also translated “kidnappers”). Since the kidnapping and trading of Africans was the source of all American slavery, the New Testament does condemn the entire system of slavery as practiced by America.
Because we are 2,000-4,000 years and thousands of miles removed from the setting of the Bible, it’s easy to take for granted the wide gulf between their world and ours. Even terminology that seems straightforward and unambiguous to us might have meant something very different to them. The way they viewed family, marriage, government, economics, and even church was different from and sometimes even antithetical to ours. We must take that into account when we interpret. That leads into the third consideration.
#3. Consider that you might be viewing it under the unexamined assumption that your culture is superior to others.
Obviously, some of the Bible’s teachings are highly offensive in our current cultural climate. For example, our culture prizes individualism and personal liberty, and so we may be offended by some of the things that the Bible says about sexuality, submission to authority, and salvation through Christ alone. They may come across as offensive and intolerant.
But we shouldn’t think ourselves special in that regard. Indeed, the Bible spares no culture and no worldview. Other cultures are scandalized by teachings in the Bible that we would view as beautiful. Some cultures, for example, may prize loyalty and justice above all else. So when the Bible teaches that we should forgive our enemies and forsake even our families to follow Christ, they may find that cowardly and weak. I read of one missionary who encountered a culture that valued self-preservation and ambition so much that they saw Judas as a hero! They were appalled by the idea of worshiping the man who let himself be betrayed. Every culture finds some point in the Bible that offends their values.
And, as Keller explains, that’s exactly what we should expect if the Bible is the word of God! If humanity is, as the Bible says, fallen and sinful, then we should expect the word of God to have uncomfortable things to say to every one of us. None of us conforms to God’s standard, and the flaws of each one of us are as varied as the stars. If we are naturally sinful and hostile to God, then it’s no surprise that each of us will find something in God’s word that provokes hostility in us. And that is exactly what we find.
So before we conclude that the Bible is wrong, we should consider that by our opposition we may be proving the Bible right.
Conclusion
We would really like it if the Bible said the things we wanted it to say, in the way we wanted it to say them. That isn’t the purpose of God’s word. The question is not whether you will encounter things in the Bible that are offensive to you, but which things in the Bible will offend you.
I think that sometimes even those of us who are Christians want God to constantly prove himself to us. When we come to God, we start from a place of doubt rather than of trust. If we bring this attitude to the Bible, then we will be skeptical of every passage that offends our sensibilities. We will continually demand that God’s word prove to us that it is trustworthy, and we will use every point where it doesn’t do so to our satisfaction as ammunition and justification for our doubt. That’s exactly the kind of approach that will lead to us misunderstanding and misapplying the Bible. So this is why I think Tim Keller’s three steps are so important to remember. Very often, it seems that those who reject parts of the Bible haven’t considered them.
Everyone will have issues with the Bible. Not one person will ever have satisfying answers to every problematic passage. If you think you do, then you’re probably misunderstanding something. If you’re holding out on committing to Christ because some things in the Bible disturb you, then it’s vital that you go through this process of consideration. It’s a tragedy when people reject what they believe to be the Bible when in fact they’re rejecting a misinterpretation (or questionable interpretation) of it.
For Christians, it’s vital that when we approach the word of God, we approach it from a place of default trust rather than of default skepticism. if we truly believe the Bible is the word of God, then when we encounter something in the Bible that offends us, we should first consider that the problem lies with us rather than with God. We need to be sure that we are properly understanding Scripture. That requires time, effort, and practice. Our understanding will be constantly refined and reshaped over the years as we apply our own personal experiences. Sometimes it might take decades for us to finally understand what a passage means. But being changed by God’s grace requires a humble, uncomfortable trust and obedience.
