I recently came across this quip of advice: "Don't be so open-minded that your brains fall out."

   Certainly that is sound advice in view of today's promoted social etiquette. Nowadays the "intellectual fashion" it to be so flexible, so tolerant that you can agree with everyone about everything. It's as if doubt were a virtue and conviction a vice. And perhaps there is not a better illustration of this than in some of the statements of religious denominationalism.

   For example, it is often said that "one interpretation is as good as another." Now the intent of that statement is to justify man's practice to hold and teach different explanations of the Bible, even conflicting and contradictory ones! Unfortunately, it only serves to encourage people to maintain their religious diversity rather than obey God's mandates to "speak the same things, that there be no divisions, but perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment" (1 Corinthians 1:10). And people who believe that differing "interpretations" of the Bible are equally valid have failed to think that through.

   The author of the Bible is God (2 Timothy 3:16) and God is NOT the author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33). Therefore, the Bible is NOT a book of confusion. It does not contradict; it has a true and correct meaning. And so, one interpretation of the Bible is NOT as good as another. God wants it understood and followed accurately, not in contradictory ways.

   Jesus taught that all men must learn, obey and abide in His words, the truth, if they are to be His disciples (John 8:31,32). To say that "one interpretation is as good as another," is to say that people who do not know, nor obey the truth, are just as well off as those who do! But the Bible emphatically teaches that is NOT so (e.g. Matthew 7:21-27; Romans 2:6-10). The apostle John wrote there is "the spirit of truth AND the spirit of error" (1 John 4:9), and by no means are they equal or without consequence (2 John 9).

   If you would like to learn more about understanding the Bible, ask for our booklet, "How to Study the Bible." It's free!