How the Bible Actually Works: In Which I Explain How An Ancient, Ambiguous, and Diverse Book Leads Us to Wisdom Rather Than Answers—and Why That's Great News

Peter Enns

Feb 2019 · Sold by HarperCollins

About this ebook

Controversial evangelical Bible scholar, popular blogger and podcast host of The Bible for Normal People, and author of The Bible Tells Me So and The Sin of Certainty explains that the Bible is not an instruction manual or rule book but a powerful learning tool that nurtures our spiritual growth by refusing to provide us with easy answers but instead forces us to acquire wisdom.

For many Christians, the Bible is a how-to manual filled with literal truths about belief that must be strictly followed. But the Bible is not static, Peter Enns argues. It does not hold easy answers to the perplexing questions and issues that confront us in our daily lives. Rather, the Bible is a dynamic instrument for study that not only offers an abundance of insights but provokes us to find our own answers to spiritual questions, cultivating God’s wisdom within us.

“The Bible becomes a confusing mess when we expect it to function as a rulebook for faith. But when we allow the Bible to determine our expectations, we see that Wisdom, not answers, is the Bible’s true subject matter,” writes Enns. This distinction, he points out, is important because when we come to the Bible expecting it to be a textbook intended by God to give us unwavering certainty about our faith, we are actually creating problems for ourselves. The Bible, in other words, really isn’t the problem; having the wrong expectation is what interferes with our reading.

Rather than considering the Bible as an ancient book weighed down with problems, flaws, and contradictions that must be defended by modern readers, Enns offers a vision of the holy scriptures as an inspired and empowering resource to help us better understand how to live as a person of faith today.

How the Bible Actually Works makes clear that there is no one right way to read the Bible. Moving us beyond the damaging idea that “being right” is the most important measure of faith, Enns’s freeing approach to Bible study helps us to instead focus on pursuing enlightenment and building our relationship with God—which is exactly what the Bible was designed to do.

Ratings and reviews

I received an advanced copy of this book, provided by Harper One. How the Bible Actually Works is a great explanation of the Bible and its purpose. If you've read The Bible Tells Me So, then you'll already have the right framework for what this book expounds upon. Basically, the way modern American protestantism demands the Bible be read doesn't hold up under scrutiny. So we can either throw out the Bible, or throw out our interpretation of it. This book advocates for the latter by demonstrating how the Bible has been misused and abused and contorted into something it was never meant to be: a rule book or constitution. Instead we are presented with a diversity of perspectives over a long period of time, and sometimes those perspectives are contradictory. And that is ok. The Bible isn't meant to hand us all the answers on a silver platter. It's meant to grow us so that we know how to wrestle with the questions, even when we don't know the right answers.

About the author

Peter Enns (PhD, Harvard University) is the Abram S. Clemens Professor of Biblical Studies at Eastern University, St. David’s, Pennsylvania. He has also taught courses at Harvard University, Fuller Theological Seminary, and Princeton Theological Seminary. He is the host of The Bible for Normal People podcast, a frequent contributor to journals and encyclopedias, and the author of several books, including The Sin of Certainty, The Bible Tells Me So, and Inspiration and Incarnation. He lives in northern New Jersey.