By Rev. Landon Coleman
Pastor, Immanuel
At Immanuel, we’ve spent the summer months working through a sermon series titled “What’s Your Favorite Bible Verse.” This sermon series had its genesis in several online lists of the most popular Bible verses. We took data from World Vision, Bible Gateway, YouVersion, and Crosswalk and compiled a list of our “favorite” Bible verses. According to these websites and mobile apps, the verses on our list are among the most read and most searched for verses in the Bible.
I’ll be honest, most of the favorite verses reported by these websites and apps are exactly what you might expect. The list is dominated by verses that offer us comfort and inspiration. The list is dominated by what you might call “K-Love” verses – verses that are “positive and encouraging.” The obvious favorites made the list, verses like Jeremiah 29:11 (for I know the plans I have for you), John 3:16 (for God so loved the world), Philippians 4:13 (I can do all things), Psalm 23:1, (the LORD is my shepherd), and Isaiah 41:10 (fear not, for I am with you).
These hopeful, inspirational verses are just the kind of verses I expected to see on these online lists. To be honest, these are the kinds of verses that Americans love to take out of context. We ignore the fact that Jeremiah 29:11 was written to beleaguered exiles. We ignore the fact that John 3:16 is followed by a serious warning of judgment. We ignore the fact that Philippians 4:13 was written by a man in chains. We ignore the fact that Psalm 23 also speaks about walking through the valley of the shadow of death. We ignore the fact that Isaiah 41:10 was written to people who were about to be conquered and exiled. We are quick to ignore the context of these great verses, and in doing so we twist these verses into proof texts that God will make us healthy, wealthy, happy, and comfortable all the days of our lives.
In our summer sermon series, we have tried to understand the beauty and the glory of these well-known verses – beauty and glory that only shines brighter when you read each verse in context and disentangle each verse from the poison of the prosperity gospel. Each week I’ve found myself thinking, “This verse doesn’t mean what most people assume it means – and most people are selling these great verses short by ignoring the broader context!”
Tomorrow at Immanuel, we will look at another kind of verse. We are going to consider James 1:2-4, Ephesians 6:10-12, 1 Peter 5:6-11, and 2 Corinthians 12:7-10. I’ll leave you to read these verses on your own, and I’ll make a few comments for your consideration. First, these verses cannot be twisted into anything resembling the prosperity gospel. Two, these verses are raw and honest about the suffering we experience in life – suffering that cannot be magically prayed away by all the prosperity teaching in the world. Three, these verses remind me of the often-repeated adage, “It takes a whole Bible to make a whole Christian.”
I genuinely hope you have a favorite Bible verse, but I also hope your theology is built on more than one verse taken out of context.
