Cut through the Chaos with Scripture

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness. (2 Timothy 3:16)

Our world is a confusing place to live right now. And people are looking for values, wisdom, and discernment in the midst of the confusion. Unfortunately, many are looking in the wrong place – searching for guidance from our culture rather than Scripture.

But 2 Timothy 3:16 says that the Bible should light the way because it’s God’s very Word.

Many Christians believe this in theory but fail to follow through in practice. Instead, believers live in ways that indicate we don’t believe in the sufficiency and authority of Scripture to navigate cultural confusion.

So when it comes to issues like biblical manhood, womanhood, marriage, family… we rely on culture rather than Scripture. In many ways we are living as functional atheists.

As a result, when things go wrong and the wheels start to fall off the bus, we don’t even remember how to go back to the Scriptures to figure out what we’re supposed to do.

Too often, we’re simply not prepared.

But as Christians, we need to heed 1 Peter 3:15 which exhorts us to…

Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect. 

There are two reasons why this is so vital.

First, we must be prepared so that we will not fall prey to distortions of God’s Word.

Those who want to tear down the authority of Scripture will often attempt to use the Bible against Christians to support their arguments.

Ask yourself, Why do non-Christians use the Bible against Christians?

Because many self-professing Christians don’t know Scripture well enough to fight back against the twisting of biblical truth.

Paul warned of this in 2 Timothy 4:2–4, when he wrote…

“Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths”.

The problem with so many of the ideologies that are being pushed in society today is that they are just close enough to truth to sound good. It’s an almost but not quite truth.

It’s been said that a half-truth is far more dangerous than a whole lie. That’s because it’s easier to spot a lie and run from it. But unless we have a firm understanding of the full truth of God’s Word, then a half-truth that sounds close enough can lead us astray.

You see this danger play out in issues like justice. There is a big difference between biblical justice and social justice. Social justice is about distributive justice. It’s about redistributing resources and privileges to try to get equitable outcomes.

Biblical justice, on the other hand, is quite simply the righteous application of the law of God. Ironically, social justice almost always flies in the face of biblical justice.

So we must prepare our minds with a proper understanding of Scripture so that when someone tries to misapply it, or inject their own agenda into a passage, we can defend against the half-truths and hold to the authority of God’s Word.

Secondly, we need to be prepared because we have answers the world needs.

As believers, we have the answers to the world’s biggest problems, and chief among those answers is the gospel of Jesus.

When we properly understand the fullness of the gospel, we can speak into issues like racism, equality, justice, and demonstrate how the answers the world offers are antithetical to the gospel.

We need to be prepared to offer an answer whenever we have the opportunity to speak to those who are pushing an agenda that is contrary to the revealed truth of Scripture.

There is so much talk these days about individual truth – you have your truth, and I have my truth. But the actual Truth of Scripture isn’t an individual thing, and it doesn’t change based on what is in vogue.

God’s Truth is eternal and revealed to us in the pages of Scripture.

So dig into God’s Word, and be prepared, when asked, to winsomely give a response for the hope you have in Christ. Because that is the only hope for our mixed-up world, now and forever.

Voddie, one of the more prolific pastors of our day, is known for his ability to demonstrate the Bible’s relevance to everyday life without compromising the centrality of Christ and the gospel. Whether teaching on classical apologetic issues like the validity and historicity of the Bible or the resurrection of Christ or teaching on biblical manhood/womanhood, marriage and family, or the Social Justice Movement, he helps ordinary people understand the significance of thinking and living biblically in every area of life.