K. Rex Butts

I'm always thankful people are reading the Bible. In his commentary on Acts, Willing Jennings says this about Paul in Acts 28, “Paul has come to a great point of clarification—everything pivots on Jesus of Nazareth. Paul is trying to turn the reading practices of his own people in a new direction in, toward and through the life of Jesus."

Lat’s pray that churches can meet people where they are at and as they read the Bible together, help lead people to live as followers of Jesus Christ who embody the kingdom of God.

Reading the Bible is great but how we read the Bible also matters. Having humility is a part of that how, for we are all capable of co-opting the Bible to support our own pre-conceived ideas. So read the Bible but read it with humility.

The Dunning-Kruger effect means that we are prone to trust our own fool-hearted expertise over actual science even though there isn’t any credible research to support the conclusion our expertise has drawn.

Self-perception is often self-deception… self-expertise surely is!

Words have consequences. We all are guilty of saying something unkind, unnecessary, and sometimes even hurtful. Wisdom means giving consideration to how we speak and the kind of cultural seeds we sow with our rhetoric. The well-known acronym T.H.I.N.K (Thoughtful-Helpful-Inspiring-Necessary-Kind) is a great place to begin considering how we speak to others. This goes for everything from our public discourse to how we speak with our husband/wife and children.