Why I DON'T Take The Entire Bible Literally... 

Jesus affirms these events... Adam and Eve - Matthew 19:4-6 Noah and the flood - Matthew 24:36-39 Jonah - Matthew 12:38-42 ✅My other channel, Lion of Fire Ministries ⬇️ youtube.com/@lionoffireministries?si=ydSUYuqtaoPUjEYt *If you like, please consider donating* 🙂🙏 (see links below) Patreon link: www.patreon.com/lionoffireministries Paypal link: www.paypal.me/lionoffireministries Also subscribe on* RUMBLE: rumble.com/c/LIONofFIRE

I love His Word. Jeremiah 15:16 “Your Words are what sustain me. They bring me great joy and are my heart’s delight, for I bear Your name, O LORD God Almighty.”

I didn't read through the comments but I've heard it said that some things in the Bible are "prescriptive" and some are "descriptive." That helps me keep "perspective." :) I really enjoy your videos!

In other words, read the Bible exegetically and you will see what it actually means and have an even deeper appreciation for it.

Amen! I talk about this often.🙏✝️❤️

please pray for us your hearers that we will be changed through and by your msg, Thank you

You have to be guided and taught by the Holy Spirit to understand the bible and the metaphors in it

In short, we take the Bible literally, unless the context indicates otherwise. Looking at the genre of a book can help too. The Psalms and Song of Solomon have a lot of poetry (so looking at many of the passages in a metaphorical or allegorical method will help us to make sense of them), whereas books like Samuel, Kings, Chronicles and the Gospels and Acts have a lot of history recorded in them, so taking a literal sense here is the best sense. 👍👍

Amen, brother. 100% with you on this.

Thank you, Holy Spirit, for guiding us in all truth! 🙏

There are different literary styles to different books of the Bible. Reading them with an understanding of their styles helps one to see the truth of their message. Thanks. Have a great Sunday.

Amen and thank you.

I just love how you keep it short, but sweet! Thank you, Matt! And I love how you say the body and blood of Christ (communion) is symbolic to Jesus, not really his true body and blood, of course! Blessings!

Well explained….metaphors…..love your explanations!!!!

Thank you..Matt…appreciate your teaching!😊

Well said agree totally 💯👏👏

Spot on 👌

Amen. Jesus spoke like that ( parables ) so his words would be hidden to those who will not inherit the kingdom. Matthew 13:10-12

Hi Matt Thanks for sharing and explaining. Extremely well done. 🙏❤️

Someone said if God created the heavens and earth and Jesus CHRIST rose from the dead then everything in between is possible.

Great teaching.

Great lesson! Thank you, Matthew!

Perfectly said, as always 🙏

1:28 moving mountains...

Thank YOU young Preacher!!! John 17:17 KJB

"If your right hand--- even your stronger hand--- causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away." (Matt 5:30 NLT) "If you eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better to enter eternal life with only one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into the fires of hell." (Matt 18:9 NLT) Obviously, Jesus did not intend for you to literally, physically do these things. He was trying to make a point that you must remove yourself from situations that tempt and provoke you to commit sin. You should get rid of any posessions or any people that direct your priorities from God.

Here are some Bible verses that nobody takes literally⬇️ {Matthew 5: 29-30} 29) If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30) And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. I've never heard of a Christian gouging their eye out or cutting their right hand off, I'm not about to do either of the above either, therefore Christians don't take these Bible Verses literally.

God bless you Matt and your loved ones in the Holy Name of Jesus Christ!✝️🙏❤️ Excellent explanations! ✝️🙏❤️

You've said it all pretty well 😎. I think often when people in the world ask if one takes the Bible literally what they are probably asking is: "do you do whatever the Bible tells you" or "do you follow all its supposed rules" 🤔. Therefore, I feel like the proper response is "it depends on what you're reading" 🤔. As you showed, if one is reading something figurative that Jesus said you will obviously take that differently from a descriptive historical narrative 🤔.

Correct. The Lord speaks in hyperbolic sometimes.

In order to discover the authors' intentions, the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating. For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression. ( which seem like contradictions)

Can I ask when it says in John 6:37 “All those the Father gives to me will come to me,and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. “ Does this mean the Father chooses who will be saved,or do we decide if we want to be saved or not?

YES!!!!

2:12 *transubstantiation enters the chat.*

How about predestination? What's your take on that? Seems a lot of Christians don't want to discuss it.

Also, Jesus spoke in alot of parables

We view the Old Testament laws as: Kingdom of Israel (gone), Temple Laws (gone) and Moral Laws (those are still with us!). The closer we are to following the moral laws, the more freedom we have…The less we follow them, the more slave-like we are. Obeying His laws gives one a life of purpose.

Matt…have you heard about the most ridiculous “theory” coming down the pike now? The gap theory.

I've always known what you've meant. Bless you 🙏🙏🙏✝️✝️✝️

This is correct. Most of the Bible is literal and historical facts. However, the New Testament is filled with parables and other Hebrew sayings in order to speak to the first Jewish Christians in that time. They understood perfectly what Jesus was saying. Our job in modern day is to interpret the sayings and see how they apply to the primary theme of the Bible, which is Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. The other reason for the concealment was to protect Christ and to protect God's ultimate plan from Satan. The Devil wants to destroy anything on this planet related to God, so by not telling him the entire story in a plain fashion, it helped to keep him guessing and therefore not prepared for what is coming.

The problem is when we decide a regular expository passage somehow does not mean what it says because it does not fit a theological system. If you do your due diligence, scripture will self define frequently used pictures and euphemisms. When it comes to prophecy, if we read the prophesies of the First Coming, much of Daniel, and Isaiah’s prophecies from his day through Cyrus, we see that prophecy is surprising straight forward. Decoding images of what will happen 2000 years later may be tricky, so do not base your theology on them, but other details can be taken pretty straight forward.

You are right again. It's not possible to take a 100% literal translation of the Bible and have a proper understanding of God's word. Although the flood in Jonah are accurate as written. It's not a stretch for God to protect Jonah inside of a big fish for 3 days and then have him appear to the Ninevites, who worshipped a fish god. And although on the surface it seems impossible for Noah and his family to build an ark and then house thousands of animals for 40 days. It is very easy to assume God assisted him in many ways, especially when trending to the animals. Just because it doesn't give every single supernatural detail doesn't mean it didn't happen. As long as it doesn't change the subject being discussed it's perfectly sensible to assume God did many supernatural acts throughout history that aren't listed in his word. However while God is 100% supernatural he is also 100% natural. He created the laws of nature stands by them just as he expects us to do. Take in Revelation for example when Satan is labeled as a dragon, serpent, and so on, we know those are just rolls that he plays. There is no such thing as a talking snake as it literally says in the Garden. Satan is not a shape shifter😂 and able to turn himself into talking snakes and fire breathing dragons😬. His evil actions are best represented by those who animals. The same, to a degree at least, can be said when Jesus spoke in parables. He simply wasn't telling a story. Each parable has a revealing Biblical meaning behind it.🤟🏼✌🏼💪🏼🙏🏼

There is a more subtle version of this, and a great example is the Reformed interpretation of Romans 2-7. Writing a letter to the church in Rome, Paul refers to you, I and we in the present tense, and yet the Reformed view insists he is either talking past his audience to the rest of the world, or he is talked about his audience’s life before being saved. This is justified by assuming some literary style in an expository writing, or some magic Reformed Greek tenses were used and no one has ever translated it correctly.

Like eating Jesus every time you have communion. He was speaking spiritually

I take the Bible literally ( unless it's obviously metaphorical like Jesus being the Door of the Sheep for instance) which is why I believe for example in a literal 1000 years reign of Christ. Also many other predictions of Revelation can be taken literally, even when they're hard to believe in the first place.

I have to adamantly disagree with you on this. The entire Bible, even events and dates, should ALWAYS be taken literally because THEY HAPPENED. I am going to tell you why, and this is going to break your heart that this happened to me, so please listen. When I was about 27 years of age, I met a woman that I dated for a while. Her family were NOT Christians, and so they threatened me to never see their daughter again. They stated in exact words: "The Bible is ok, but not to be taken literally." And I have heard this from almost every person who will accept the Bible in cherry-picking, but they will ALWAYS say, "but only an idiot takes the Bible literally." That says to us: The Bible cannot be all true or all that important, and we should just take what we want and ignore what we do not want to hear, or dates and events. I have read the entire Bible. It is common sense spiritually and literally to me. Someone once said, "The Bible is hard to understand." I said if you pray, the Lord will help you. But in all reality when you know the Gospel of Christ and how Genesis to Revelation plans out, including the Book of Enoch not currently in the main Bible, the truth become clear, in all reality. Taking God's Word literally as truth is the point. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God." GOD IS THE WORD.

But the metaphors are to be taken literally because of what they mean. Someone who actually doesn’t take the Bible literally , for instance, does not believe in a new earth or that creation was a literal 6 days. Thats very different.

In reality Scriptures are Hidden, when you read them Spiritually, they say one thing, but if you read them only intellectually, they will always say what you want to hear.

Do you believe that the lake of fire is literal or spiritual?

...And the floating axe head!!!!

FOR THEY NOT HEAR MY WORD THEY WILL WEEP WHAT THEY SOW FOR I AM THE LIGHT AND THE WAY FOR I AM THE ONLY CHURCH

I can certainly agree with you on these things. The only thing that no one will be able to know is literally how long ago everything before the time of Moses was and how long the creation of the whole universe took. There is plenty of controversy with whether the whole creation took place in six literal 24 hour days and whether or not six thousand years is the literal age of the earth and universe or not, and these are points that the Bible does not confirm and for that reason I don't believe the results of that really matters like the rest of the truths do that the scriptures make completely clear. You should have addressed where you are on all of these along with the other stuff you pointed out.

Amen!!! We must read the Bible with the help of the Holy Spirit. It is interesting that some people take what they like and believe it literally and dismiss others that are literal and say they are spiritual. Sadly the devil has caused denominations to believe the opposite of what God said to make it say what He did not say or mean.

I agree with most your points but you sneakily put the word 'represents' when talking about Jesus' body and blood when He never said that at all.

The book of Job is a parable - why would God make a "bet" with Satan, He is God, He has nothing to prove to Satan. Why would God gamble with the lives of Job's children and let Satan kill them so they don't deserve to live but the other children later on did deserve to live?

That's brilliantly explained, all born again christains truly believe in the supernatural events of the bible, sadly unbelievers think we are nuts to believe in for example, a talking donkey, may sound unbelievable but we know that it 100% happened because nothing is impossible with God.

I watch a channel called - Answers in genesis Canada - you’ve probably seen it I’m guessing Matt?

Everyone has to understand that it's all by faith!! No one can prove anything from the scriptures, because if you could, then it's not about faith anymore.When Jesus spoke to the multitudes, many didn't have a clue on what HE spoke about, but then some could understand. Many followed Jesus only to get a free meal or to see a miracle, but they still didn't believe. Didn't Jesus say " many are called, but few are chosen"? So take the Bible as a great and wonderful source of inspiration and knowledge, but it's not the word of God. Doesn't the Bible state that JESUS CHRIST is Bread of life? JESUS is THE WORD of GOD, and the Bible is a book containing HIS words. Jesus still speaks to HIS people today in our hearts. Jesus stated, "if you will keep my commandments, then I and MY FATHER will come inside you and lead you to all truth"

Totally agree with what you have said Matt. Certain things were never meant to be taken literally. But e have to be careful not to believe the lies put out by people that things like Noah’s ark , Adam and Eve are not true . Very wise Matt

Its always funny that Christians think Jesus is real, and even think they have some relationship with him, but can't get him to answer even the simplest of questions, leading to every Christian believing what they themselves think is true.

Do you take Genesis 1 literally?

You’re walking on dangerous ground my friend, which could confuse new believers. Best you leave your opinions of your interpretation to yourself as you’re bordering on pride lately. It’s not your job to point out what only God can judge. Jesus said spread the gospel, not your opinion of it or who is and isn’t doing it. Stay on course with spreading the gospel, anything is of the flesh

You do not understand yourself

Once u have to defend why u don't believe it literally ur on the ropes. And ur the guy that said Vlad Savchuk was in err?? You should a just stayed preaching encouraging.

The kjb is the perfect word of god.