What's the Bible for?

An invitation to live as God’s love

What’s the Bible for? We asked dozens of writers to respond to this question in seven words or less, as well as to expand on their response in a few sentences. We acknowledged several concerns the question might raise—that it is about the present rather than the past, that it assumes the existence of a single Bible rather than multiple Bibles, that it implies intent without saying whose, that it assumes that the Bible is indeed for something. Still, we encouraged them to devote all seven words to answering the question rather than challenging it, and they delivered a wide variety of answers.

An invitation to live as God’s love

The Bible is a love story. God’s love drives the plot—a love revealed in stories and laws, in poems and prayers, in prophecies about God’s embrace of all life. The Bible testifies to God’s desire for us, to be near us—closer to us than we are to ourselves, as Augustine of Hippo put it. This drama includes us as we become living words, Christ’s love for the world written with our lives.

Isaac S. Villegas

Isaac S. Villegas is an ordained minister in Mennonite Church USA and a PhD student in religion at Duke University.

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