So why do so many claim that the Bible is difficult to understand? For some, it’s not in trying to grasp the most obvious reading, but in accepting the implications of that reading.
There’s no doubt that some parts of the Bible are hard to understand. It reflects the places, histories, cultures and languages of places long ago and far away. Sometimes you need to have some background information on those issues to make sense of it, and there are some passages that people might disagree about.
But on the essential teachings and issues, the Bible leaves little room for confusion. As Mark Twain was known to quip, “It’s not the parts of the Bible I don’t understand that disturb me, rather it’s the parts of the Bible that I do understand that disturb me.”
So that’s the Bible and three things about it we should all be able to convey to a post-Christian world. Once those three things are understood, hopefully we can introduce them to a hugely important fourth aspect: Its message.
This article originally appeared here and is used by permission.
