You’ve found yourself in a mini-series on Rebranding the church. If you missed it, then I recommend reading the introduction. Essentially, we believe that followers of Jesus should be most recognized for what they contribute to the world instead of what they are against in the world. Each week we tackle something the church must demonstrate they support.
Focussing on the Bible in church seems like common sense, yet it happens far too rarely today. But if we hope to have any consistency in our message (or “brand”), we must all be speaking from the same message. The Bible is the only thing that can provide that consistent message for the church.
More importantly, the Bible speaks an incredible message. It is one full of hope, grace, peace, forgiveness, and love for a broken world. While I cannot expect all churches everywhere to suddenly agree on everything in the Bible, I know wonderful things would happen if we all spent more time in the Word, both at church and at home.
It is quite shocking how rarely many contemporary churches open the Bible. A preacher might only quote one or two verses, if any, during his sermon. Instead of hearing the Word of God, we get a pep talk about positivity and doing good things.
While some argue that the Bible is irrelevant to the modern world, they are wrong. Every single church I have attended that opened the Bible and taught large portions of it has been extremely fruitful. Not only have I seen attendance grow, but there has been a real depth of understanding and high level of fulfillment for the people.
In The Pursuit of God, A.W. Tozer says, “The Bible is not an end in itself, but a means to bring men to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God, that they may enter into Him, that they may delight in His Presence, may taste and know the inner sweetness of the very God Himself in the core and center of their hearts.”
If a church thinks people will be bored by that, then they should disband. As 2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” Think about it, if the Bible truly is God’s Word, breathed out for us, then who wouldn’t want to hear it? And it was given for our benefit!
We need to spend more time in the Word personally as well. Our brains are swamped by constant messaging. For instance, you hear 3,000 advertisements everyday. Most of them want us to believe their product is the key to life satisfaction. If we do not remind ourselves of the actual Truth, we won’t remember it for long. That is why God’s Word is so important for us.
God’s Word is living and active. Nothing can help prevent hypocrisy and judgmentalism like spending time in the Bible. When we read it, we are convicted of our own sin, but also we are reminded of the freedom we now have because of the cross. It reminds us of who we are and makes us become more like Christ.
And being like Christ is the best brand image we could ever ask for.
If you need more convincing in your personal walk, check out the 5 promises we have from God’s Word about spending time in His Word.
And here is some more support, straight from the Bible itself:
Psalms 1:1-3
Blessed is the man
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
but his delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree
planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.
Lastly, there are some who doubt the validity of the Bible. To them, I challenge them to study it, and start with the Gospels. Pray that God will reveal His truth to you, whatever it may be. I bet you won’t be disappointed.
If we want to see change in the church and the world, then we must return to the Bible. We should not use the Bible to justify the beliefs we have, but rather the Bible should define our beliefs. It is essential that we allow the Word of God to speak for itself. Because when God speaks, the world changes.
What is your favorite Bible verse? And, how often does your church open the Bible?
Great post!
However I’m not sure I agree with this: “The Bible is the only thing that can provide that consistent message for the church.” There are so many different interpretations of scriptures and cherry picking of verses that lead to differences on a number of key issues: homosexuality, universalism, evolution, women in ministry, necessity of baptism, etc. We see the Baptist church on the corner proclaiming a certain bible-based message on an issue, while the Episcopalian church down the block teaches a very different bible-based message on the same issue.
Jesus wanted unity in his church and promised that the Holy Spirit would guide it, but seems like the bible isn’t what’s going to provide that unified message. We need some type of authoritative body to settle all the differences of opinion.
Hi Rob, thanks for the comment! I think a possible solution is to use the entire Bible instead of cherry-picking. As you said, people can twist the words to say whatever they want, but a careful examination of the entire thing tends to lead to agreement on the major issues. Another solution is to allow scripture to interpret scripture. As the Bible was written over 2,000 years, many passages help us understand other passages. We can use the same methods they did to interpret the scripture. And the third solution I’d suggest is to always accompany interpreting the Bible with prayer that the Holy Spirit would guide your interpretation.
Authoritive bodies can certainly be helpful and have guided several denominations. But ultimately, they must work from something. I would propose that needs to be God’s word.
And sorry for the delayed response. I’m curious how you found this post, it’s a couple years old now and I had to think a bit longer!
Thanks for your reply, Evan.
I think I just came across the post via a Google search, but I sure don’t recall the terms I might have used. Just poking around.
Where I’m struggling is with the fact that many bible-only, thoughtful, reasonable, Spirit-led Christian denominations do disagree on important topics. Like whether it’s possible to lose one’s salvation. Calvinists say no, Wesleyans say yes. They’re studying the exact same bible but arrive at very different conclusions.
Should we just embrace the view which we like best? If we do our own prayerful study and arrive at a different understanding altogether, what then?
Doesn’t seem like this is the approach Jesus intended for the early church — whose members didn’t even have a new testament to read.
Hey fair point, and that is a challenge. I think most people read the Bible (if not all) with pre-conceived notions in their head. So one might say, “I believe you can lose your salvation, and I found a passage to prove it.” And then Another might say the total opposite and look for evidence of their belief.
The challenge is to read the Bible for what it is, instead of what we want it to be, but this is a rather difficult challenge. I agree, it isn’t right to just embrace the view we like best.
Acts 17:10-12 is a good example of studying the Bible to see if something is true: “The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so. Many of them therefore believed, with not a few Greek women of high standing as well as men.”
We should examine the Scriptures daily and with eagerness, looking to understand what God has communicated. This requires humility and grace, and I believe the ability to peacefully discuss things that are difficult to understand.
Anyway, I know this isn’t a perfect answer. If there was one we probably wouldn’t have dozens of denominations in the world. The reality is, people are people and each one is different. The Word hasn’t changed in a long time, and this is why I believe we should always be returning to it, to ensure we’re doing our best to follow God’s will and guidance.