Is the Bible a rulebook, a love letter, or something else? How you answer shapes what you do with your emotions.

Episode summary

Why does the Bible sometimes feel contradictory, uncomfortable, or hard to apply, especially when it comes to your feelings? In this episode, licensed marriage and family therapist Kia Gutiérrez explores how to read Scripture, the Old and New Testament, in light of what its authors were trying to communicate.

Kia explains how the lens we bring to the Bible, whether a rulebook to follow or a love letter written to us, shapes the answers we find and what we decide to do with our emotions. She proposes reading the Bible as a written document from an ancient community, shaped by its cultural context and inspired by the Holy Spirit, using Genesis 1 as an example of asking what the author was actually saying.

She also draws a parallel between Scripture and emotions: both are tools with a specific purpose, and just as a hammer makes a poor saw, using either one in a way it wasn't designed for leads to struggle and disappointment. Along the way, you'll hear how relearning both can bring peace to the places that feel contradictory, and how to sort which emotions to act on and which to sit with, and which Scripture guides your life directly and which shapes the way you see the world.

You'll finish with a question to carry into your week: how does it feel to relearn how to read the Bible and how to feel your emotions?