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Why do those who claim to love the Bible have so much Biblical illiteracy?

Here is a truth all Christians should agree with: We are meant to lead our culture and not slavishly follow it. That includes leading in areas of morality and knowledge. But a sad reality is this: Far too often, Christians are simply pale imitations of the world around them — at least here in the West.

So if the surrounding culture is in a moral freefall, regretfully, we find this often being mirrored in the church. If things like sex outside of marriage, homosexuality and abortion — to name but a few — are all the rage in a culture, it is just too easy for so many Christians to follow suit.

And if the general culture is steadily being dumbed down, we see this so often reflected in the churches. Christians can be just as ignorant and uneducated as their pagan neighbours. And that even includes being frightfully dumbed-down when it comes to knowledge of the Scriptures. Bible knowledge of so many believers is sadly on a par with non-believers; that is, woefully poor, if not non-existent.

We see indications of these pitiful realities all the time. Whether it is people claiming to be Christians who embrace the world’s morality — or rather immorality and amorality — or so-called believers who could not tell you why the Old Testament is important, or what Jesus actually said about Himself and His deity, we see far too much of this.

But we also have more reliable indicators of this. Various sorts of research, testing, polling and surveys are often conducted by various Christian groups, and they clearly reveal the low state of Christian morality and of Christian knowledge. Both orthopraxis and orthodoxy seem to be in sad shape for so many believers today.

As far as Christian living goes, many research projects have documented this. For example, I have often written about the work of the Barna Research Group. One piece I wrote on them explores their findings on truth and morality among American Christians.

Biblical Illiteracy

A lack of basic Bible knowledge among believers has also been studied. The latest bit of research on this comes from Lifeway Research. Its latest study begins with these words:

If churches gave pop quizzes on the Bible this Sunday, most people in the pews would fail. Lifeway Research asked more than 2,000 American Christian churchgoers dozens of questions about general Bible knowledge. The average respondent scored 51. Around 2 in 3 (65%) earn an F, below 60. Almost 1 in 10 (9%) receive a D, between 60 and 69. Another 9% receive a C, between 70 and 79. Just 8% score a B, 80 to 89, and 9% reach A status, 90 and higher.

“Church leaders often theorize that churchgoers don’t know their Bibles but have typically lacked objective proof,” said Scott McConnell, executive director of Lifeway Research. “This study confirms most Christian churchgoers haven’t learned or don’t remember many things in the Bible and how it is organized.”

Some of the particular examples of this include:

Only 11% correctly order the events of Deborah judging Israel, David killing Goliath, Jonah being swallowed by a big fish and Esther delivering Israel. Churchgoers are most likely (27%) to correctly order the New Testament events of Mary’s song of thanksgiving, Nicodemus’ conversation about rebirth, Peter’s denial of Jesus and Paul’s arrest in Jerusalem.

Four in 5 (80%) Christian churchgoers can correctly fill in the blank when “believes” is left out of John 3:16. Just 28%, however, know Micah 6:8 says the Lord requires mankind to “act justly, and to love faithfulness, and to walk humbly with your God.”

Most (56%) know Mark fits in the Gospels, while 34% guess another major section of the Bible and 9% aren’t sure. On the other hand, 29% correctly place 1 Samuel in history. Most (54%) put it in a different section, including major prophets (16%), minor prophets (9%) or Gospels (6%). Around 1 in 6 (17%) aren’t sure.

Three in 4 Christian churchgoers correctly place 1 Corinthians in the New Testament (74%) and Psalms (73%) in the Old Testament. Most (55%) miss Philemon’s New Testament location, with 29% guessing it’s in the Old Testament and 26% saying it’s not a book in the Bible.

Of course, if you don’t read the Bible — or not very often — that will certainly result in dumbed-down Christians:

Around 1 in 5 (21%) say they read the Bible personally every day, and another quarter (24%) do so a few times a week. Around 1 in 10 (9%) read Scripture weekly, 14% say they read it a few times a month and 8% read once a month. Another 22% of Christian churchgoers say they rarely or never read the Bible. In a typical week, 56% of Christian churchgoers say their pastor’s sermon is an approach they use to learn the Bible.

See their report for all the sobering details.

Renewing Our Minds Through God’s Word

This dumbing-down of believers makes perfect sense when we see the sad state of America today. The recent US mid-term elections perfectly illustrate all this. Not only did millions and millions of evangelical Christians not even bother to turn out and vote, but so many of those who did went for decidedly unbiblical candidates.

A major case in point is Texas Democrat James Talarico, who actually won his Senate seat. That despite being a cultish, heretical imposter who talks ‘Christian’ talk but clearly believes nothing of historic Christianity. Recall how he said that God is non-binary, and that abortion, homosexuality and the trans agenda are the way forward for Christians. He even said this: “I always think of myself as a Christian who hates Christianity.”

And believers fell for this fraud! In a recent article about the Lifeway findings, Jen Wilkin put it this way:

Christians have succumbed to the general literacy crisis of the culture. The “people of the Book” don’t read it. The Bible itself, the classic of all classics, has apparently become a book that every Christian wants to have read, and few Christians want to read.

If we do read to sustain our faith, we’re more likely to read books about the Bible than the Bible itself. We may consume sermons or podcasts or use devotional resources that cherry-pick verses to give us a positive emotion in 10 minutes or less, but largely, we’ve become curators of other people’s opinions about a book we don’t read ourselves.

It is time for God’s people to repent of their shameful biblical ignorance and start using their minds to fully love God, as Jesus commanded us to do (Matthew 22:34-40; Mark 12:28-34; and Luke 10:25-28 – all drawing from Deuteronomy 6:4-9). Or as Paul said in Romans 12:2: “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” How many believers read that as saying, “Be transformed by the removing of your mind”?

Of course, mere Bible knowledge alone is not enough. But it is a prerequisite for properly loving and serving our Lord. As R. C. Sproul once rightly stated: “The Word of God can be in the mind without being in the heart; but it cannot be in the heart without first being in the mind.”

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Republished with thanks to CultureWatch. Image courtesy of Adobe.