- On the Misuse of Scripture

OF ALL THE BOOKS IN THE WORLD, the one most quoted, most misunderstood and most misapplied is the Bible. The error out of which this wide misuse of the Scripture springs is the notion that everything written in the Bible applies indiscriminately to everyone. This is a great mistake—no careful thinker should be deceived by it. God’s Word is addressed only to certain persons—that is, those who stand in a special relationship toward Him under the terms of redemption. Just as the Gentile nations could not claim the covenant promises that God had made with Israel, so the assurances and promises made to repentant and believing persons cannot be applied to those who are neither believing nor penitent.
The sacred words of Jesus, “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends,” have been applied to almost everyone who has given his life in the line of duty—the policeman on the beat, the doctor who crawls into a mine to minister to an injured man or the soldier who dies on the field of battle. The words are used to sanctify the acts of many men who were anything but believers and who would laugh at the whole business if they were alive to know what was going on. Christ was talking about Himself and His approaching sacrifice on the cross. The context makes this clear, and when we apply the words otherwise, we do so on our own authority and at our own risk.
Adlai Stevenson, former governor of Illinois, when going through the throes of deciding whether or not he should let his name stand for nomination for the presidency, reportedly had a deep indisposition for the office. He was quoted as having repeated the words of Christ in the garden of Gethsemane, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.
Now it is remotely possible that a true saint of God, in a moment of awful and heart-searching prayer, might in hushed reverence quote these words of the Savior and apply them to his or her own case. But their use at a political convention came as a dash of cold water in the face of some who heard. In the midst of endless billows of hoarse shouting, grandiose and unsupported claims of achievements, bitter and abusive denunciating of others who did not agree with them, senseless and moronic acts of childish demonstrating, “snake dancing” and horn blowing, obsequious flattering and downright lying, it is hard to see how the spirit of our Lord’s solemn and tender words could have a place. All political conventions are alike, regardless of party, and should Christ appear at one of them and demand that His Lordship be acknowledged and His commandments be obeyed, He would be forthright shouted down and led from the room by the sergeant at arms. Yet His words are quoted as if they had a place there--surely a painful misapplication of Scripture.
We once knew a rather dissolute young man who, in spite of his loose living, prided himself on the number of Scriptures he could quote. One night in an ordeal of anguished repentance, he turned from all sin and sought salvation through Christ. His condition seemed hopeless, but he hung on with the desperation of faith. At last the light broke and he entered into life. Telling about it afterward, he admitted with a wry smile that in the hour of his agony every verse of Scripture he had known departed from him except one—“With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.
The Holy Spirit reserves the right to activate the truth in the souls of those who come to God in the meekness of humility, but a careless or irreverent use of the words of the Bible can do no good and may do irremediable harm.