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by Max Aplin

You and I, along with every other Christian on the planet, believe some things that are untrue. Sin has corrupted human beings in every area of life, and that includes our understanding. None of us is free from holding wrong ideas about things.

Often, wrong ideas are so firmly ingrained that Christians don’t even consider the possibility that they might be mistaken. There are various influences that can lead to us having deeply held wrong beliefs.

Culture

To begin with, many of the wrong ideas Christians hold come from the culture in which they were raised. Since we could first understand speech, we have been taught to think about things in certain ways, but what we often don’t realise is that some of this thinking is culturally conditioned rather than being universal.

Importantly, every culture around the world gets some things right and some things wrong. However, we tend to be especially blind to what is wrong in our own culture.

Church denominations

Another reason why many Christians hold wrong ideas is because they are idolising a certain Christian denomination.

There are huge numbers of Christians who believe that there is one true denomination that gets everything of significance right. And many therefore accept all that this denomination teaches without ever stopping to consider whether it might be wrong on anything.

I would suggest, however, that this is wishful thinking. No one denomination gets everything of significance right. Each of them is mistaken on things to some extent.

That is not to say that there are not better and worse denominations in God’s sight. Some are much better than others overall. But there is no true denomination that is always right.

Church leaders

Another common reason for Christians holding wrong ideas is because they idolise certain church leaders.

There should be no doubt that every Christian leader will teach some error no matter how hard he prays against this. Given how we all see things indistinctly at present (1 Cor 13:12), it is very unrealistic to think that any one individual gets every single thing of significance right.

Besides, it is surely a fact that no two Christian leaders agree on every significant point. This means that if there were a leader who is always right, there could only be one of them. And to think that of the thousands of Christian leaders in the world today, the one we personally happen to like the most is the one who always gets things right is hopelessly implausible.

One sign that helps to show whether someone might be idolising a church leader is their attitude when people disagree with the leader. Those guilty of this kind of idolatry often get very offended and angry with people for simply holding a different opinion on something. Their attitude seems to be: ‘Who are you to dare to disagree with such an eminent pastor?’

I have had experiences like this where I have simply disagreed with a certain well known church leader on some point or other. I haven’t been offensive or judgmental. I have just taken a different view on something. But a Christian who seems to idolise that leader has become very angry with me just for doing that.

Parents

The influence of parents is another reason why Christians hold wrong ideas about things.

Christians who had a happy upbringing that involved good Christian parenting sometimes go through their entire lives without questioning anything of importance that their parents taught them. Either they imagine that because their parents were such good parents, they couldn’t have been wrong in anything significant. Or they experience feelings of guilt about questioning their parents’ teaching, because they think (often largely subconsciously) that this would be disrespectful. They therefore immediately suppress all thoughts of questioning what they were taught.

However, it makes no sense for a believer to think that great Christian parents can’t have been wrong on any important issue. Such an idea ignores the obvious truth that there are bound to be other excellent Christian parents who would disagree with them in some respects.

We must also be careful not to confuse love and respect for parents on the one hand, with accepting what they taught on the other. These are very different things. It is quite possible to love and respect parents deeply, yet also to disagree with some of what they taught us.

Preconceived ideas when reading the Bible

The list above contains some examples of the reasons why Christians have wrong ideas about things, although there are certainly other reasons too. Again, it must be stressed that holding wrong views is something that affects every single one of us to a greater or lesser extent.

This means that when each of us sits down to read the Bible, we come to it with some wrong preconceived ideas. And because Scripture teaches what is true, this means that when we sit down to read it, we come to it with some beliefs that contradict what it teaches.

The right attitude of heart

One of the main purposes for God giving us the Bible is to correct our wrong preconceived ideas. But if this is to happen as it should, our hearts need to be in the right place as we read it.

First, we need to realise that there are bound to be things we believe that are wrong. We should understand that our minds are damaged by sin and prone to making mistakes.

Second, as far as we can, we need to abandon preconceived ideas.

Third, we need to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, opening ourselves up to His willingness to teach us from Scripture by His Spirit.

And finally, we need to listen to what the text says, really listen. We can start by asking what the passage we are reading would have meant to the original readers. And then we can ask what it means for us today.

If we have this sort of attitude of heart towards the Bible, we will be in a great place to grow as Christians.

Many Christians don’t do this

The reason I am writing this article is because over and over and over again I encounter Christians whose approach to reading the Bible is not remotely like this. There are many who have some or other preconceived idea that contradicts Scripture, and they hold this idea with an iron grip.

Instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to shape their thinking as they read and to steer them away from their wrong views, they either ignore what the text is saying, or they start trying to force it to say something it doesn’t.

Please don’t interpret me to mean that I often encounter Christians who disagree with me on the meaning of some biblical passages, and that I am just annoyed about this. That’s not what I am talking about at all. I am talking about Christians who are clearly not trying to listen to the text because they have preconceived ideas set in stone in their minds.

One way to tell that someone has this sort of attitude is that when they are challenged on their views, they just ignore biblical passages that don’t fit with their preconceived ideas.

Let me go into a bit more detail on what I mean. Suppose that there is a biblical passage we will call passage A, and that a Christian takes a certain interpretation of this passage. Suppose too that someone else points out that this interpretation of passage A seems strongly to contradict another passage we will call passage B. If the Christian wants to interpret passage A correctly, he will also have to explain why B says what it says, because God has inspired both passages. However, if he sticks to his original interpretation of passage A while just ignoring passage B, that is a sign that he is not really interested in getting at the truth and that he is probably more interested in holding to his preconceived ideas.

I see this sort of thing all the time, and I am sure it grieves God deeply.

Summing up

Holding on to preconceived ideas as we read the Bible, then, is exactly what not to do.

Instead, when we read Scripture, we need to do our best to give up preconceived ideas along with any idols that are the root causes of these ideas. And we need to open ourselves up to the biblical text and listen as intently as we can to what it is actually saying, trusting that the Holy Spirit will do His work and teach us what is true.

I don’t think it can be overstated how important this approach is. If we do this, and if we are regularly confessing and repenting of our sins, I don’t see how we could do anything but grow as Christians.

Thanks!