First Pres Session — January 2026

Should THE BIBLE BE READ Literally?

Following the last two sermons on the authority of the Bible, Session received a thoughtful question expressing concern that the church might be moving toward insisting on strictly literal interpretations of the Bible in all matters.

We’re grateful for the question. It raises an important issue, and it gives us an opportunity to clarify how we understand and teach Scripture at First Presbyterian Church.

Let’s start by stating clearly what we affirm without reservation: we believe the Bible is the Word of God. Scripture is inspired by God, trustworthy in all that it teaches, and the final authority for faith and life. This conviction is not new, nor is it unique to our congregation. It aligns with the historic teaching of the church and is reflected in the constitution of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, as well as in the Westminster Confession of Faith, which has long shaped Presbyterian theology and which EPC elders and deacons affirm in our ordination vows. (A quick summary of what the EPC affirms about God’s Word is at the top of the Essentials of the Faith linked here.)

At the same time, affirming the Bible as God’s Word — literally God-breathed words, as 2 Timothy 3:15 puts it — is not the same thing as saying that every passage of Scripture should be interpreted literally. Those two claims are often conflated, but confusing them can actually lead to misunderstanding the Bible rather than honoring it.

Here’s what we mean: The Bible is not a single genre of writing. It includes historical narrative, poetry, prophecy, wisdom literature, parables, letters, and apocalyptic imagery. Faithful interpretation means reading each passage according to what it is and what it intends to communicate. In other words, the Bible should be taken literally where it intends to be taken literally, and figuratively where it intends to speak figuratively.

When “Literal” Reading Misses the Point

We’ll pick a straightforward example from the Old Testament to illustrate the issue. In Amos 4:6, God says, “I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities.” Cleanness of teeth? Really? Read in a rigid, literal way from our modern perspective, this might sound like a comment about dental hygiene!

In context, however, it means something quite different. What the ESV translates as “cleanness of teeth” is a Hebrew idiom meaning there was no food—no bread to leave residue on the teeth. The phrase refers to famine, which God sent as a warning, yet Israel did not respond with repentance. To insist on a surface-level literalism here would actually miss the meaning of the text.

Taking Scripture seriously, therefore, requires attentiveness to language, context, and literary form.

Historical Claims and Interpretive Questions

This same principle applies more broadly. For example, consider the debate about the historic Adam and Eve. Across the New Testament—the Gospels, Paul’s letters, apostolic preaching in Acts, and a brief reference in Jude—Adam is consistently assumed to be a real historical figure. The authors accept and teach this reality as part of the shared biblical account of creation, fall, and redemption. At First Pres, we teach accordingly. (You can look these up at Luke 3:38, Matthew 19:4-5, Mark 10:6-8, Acts 17:26, Romans 5:12-19, 1 Corinthians 15:21-22, 1 Cor. 15:45, Jude 14). 

At the same time, there has long been disagreement among Bible-believing Christians around other interpretive questions—such as the age of the earth or how best to understand the “days” of Genesis 1. These are not questions about whether the Bible is true, but about how particular passages are best interpreted. Christians, who share a high view of biblical authority, have come to different conclusions on these matters.

Clarity on the Essentials, Charity in our Differences

And so it may be helpful to clarify how this plays out in the life of our church. 

At First Pres, we make a distinction between the church’s official doctrinal standards, which guide our teaching and are required of church officers, and the breadth of conviction represented among members and regular attenders. In other words, we want to be clear about what FPC teaches while also creating appropriate space for disagreement on second or third-order issues. Unity in the essentials of the faith does not require uniformity on every interpretive question.

In summary, we do not believe faithfulness to Scripture requires rigid literalism at every point. Nor do we believe careful interpretation weakens the authority of the Bible. On the contrary, reading Scripture according to its intent is one of the primary ways we honor it as God’s Word.

We hope this clarification is helpful. We remain committed to teaching God’s Word carefully and humbly—trusting that God speaks truly and powerfully through his Holy Scriptures.