That's Not In Here: Getting Serious About What the Bible Actually Says

There is a quiet crisis unfolding inside the church, and it does not announce itself with fanfare. It creeps in slowly, dressed in compassion and good intentions, speaking in phrases that sound spiritual and feel right. It is the crisis of biblical illiteracy, and it is doing far more damage than most of us are willing to admit.

The premise is simple but sobering: not everything we believe about God actually comes from God. Some of what we call truth is really assumption. Some of what we call biblical is really cultural. And some of what we passionately defend in the name of Jesus has never actually been verified against what Jesus said.

That is worth sitting with for a moment.

Good Intentions Are Not Enough

When someone we love is grieving, we want to comfort them. When someone is hurting, we want to ease the pain. And so we reach for words that feel right, phrases that sound spiritual, and we offer them as though they carry the weight of Scripture. Sometimes they do. Sometimes they do not. And the difference matters more than we often acknowledge.
Isaiah 55:8-9 makes this plain. In those verses, God declares that his thoughts are not our thoughts and his ways are not our ways. His ways are as far above ours as the heavens are above the earth. If we take that seriously, it should produce in us a healthy reverence before we open our mouths to speak on his behalf. It should make us slow down and ask: is what I am about to say actually what God says, or is it what I feel, what I was taught, or what I have always assumed?

Good intentions are genuinely good. But they do not neutralize incomplete truth. Empathy without scriptural grounding is ultimately just an emotional response, and while emotional responses have their place, they can cause real damage when they are offered as the Word of God.

The Cost of Assumption

Assumptions are everywhere. They travel with us into adulthood, into marriage, into parenting, into politics, and yes, into faith. When we come to Jesus, we bring all of our assumptions with us. The question is whether we ever lay them down.

John 8:31-32 records Jesus speaking to those who believed in him, and his words carry a condition that is easy to overlook. He says that if they abide in his word, they are truly his disciples, and they will know the truth, and the truth will set them free. The word if is doing enormous work in that sentence. Abiding in the word is not automatic. It is a choice, a discipline, a daily surrender. And the implication is clear: those who do not abide in his word, regardless of what they call themselves, are not functioning as his disciples.
This is not a comfortable thought. It is, however, a clarifying one.

The freedom that so many people are searching for, the kind that actually holds up under pressure, is not the product of spiritual experience alone. Experience is valuable, but it must be anchored to truth. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom, and that freedom takes root in hearts that are grounded in the Word.

The Word Does Not Change

Second Timothy 3:16 reminds us that all Scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for teaching, for correction, for training in righteousness. All of it. Not the parts that are comfortable. Not the passages that align with our existing convictions. All of it.

Hebrews 4:12 goes further, describing the Word of God as living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. This is not a gentle image. The Word of God is surgical. It goes into places we would rather keep closed and does work we would rather avoid. That is precisely why so many people keep it at arm's length, engaging with it just enough to feel informed but not enough to be transformed.

Psalm 119:105 offers a different picture, describing God's Word as a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. Without that light, we are navigating in the dark, following paths that feel right but may lead somewhere dangerous. Proverbs 4:12 warns that there is a way that seems right to a person, but its end is the way of death. Assumptions, no matter how sincere, are not a reliable guide.

A Harder Look at What We Believe

Isaiah 5:20 contains one of the most urgent warnings in all of Scripture. It pronounces woe on those who call evil good and good evil, who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness. It is tempting to read that verse and think immediately of the culture around us. But what if the more honest application begins closer to home?

Is it possible that something we call good is actually evil? Is it possible that something we have dismissed as wrong is actually right? These are not comfortable questions, but they are necessary ones. Ephesians 5:15-17 calls us to walk carefully, not as unwise but as wise, making the most of the time because the days are evil, and to understand what the will of the Lord is.

Understanding the will of the Lord requires more than feeling strongly about something. It requires going to the source.

The Invitation

None of this is meant to produce shame. It is meant to produce honesty. Every one of us has carried assumptions into our faith. Every one of us has, at some point, spoken with more confidence than our actual knowledge of Scripture warranted. The grace of God is large enough to cover all of it.

But grace is not a reason to stay comfortable in our ignorance. It is a reason to come honestly before God and ask him to search our hearts, to reveal the places where our passion has outrun our understanding, and to bring everything we believe into alignment with what he has actually said.

The Word of God is not a threat to genuine faith. It is the foundation of it. And the church that holds tightly to it, even when it is costly, even when it is uncomfortable, is the church that will have something real to offer a world that is desperately searching for truth.