What Work Hours Can Teach Us About Bible Reading
– 1 Corinthians 2:13
“And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.”
Let’s talk about a phrase nearly everyone knows: “I work a 9 to 5.”
We all nod in understanding. We picture traffic, office chairs, bad coffee, and long emails. But here’s the thing: most people who say they work “9 to 5” don’t. Some clock in at 7:00 a.m. and leave by 3:30. Others work 8 to 4:30 with a 30-minute lunch. But no one responds, “Aha! Gotcha! You’re not telling the truth!” That would be absurd.
Why? Because we understand what they mean. “9 to 5” is a figure of speech, a cultural shorthand. It’s not a punch-card confession. It’s a way of saying, “I have a normal job during the day and, yes, I do deserve pizza tonight.”
But oddly, when it comes to Scripture, many people toss common sense out the window. They demand a level of wooden literalism they would never apply to their coworkers, calendars, or coffee orders.
The Bible speaks human. It speaks in metaphors, idioms, cultural phrases, and ancient expressions. If you read the Bible like a legal contract or a scientific manual, you may get confused. Worse, you may start accusing it of “errors” when the only real error is reading a 2,000-year-old Jewish text like it was written last Tuesday by your accountant.
C.S. Lewis—bless him for his combination of reason and readability—once remarked that those who claim the Bible is full of contradictions often show themselves to be “poor readers.” Why? Because they expect it to behave like a technical document, not a divinely inspired library of poetry, prophecy, history, biography, and vision.
Lewis didn’t believe the Bible should be treated as all literal or all symbolic—he believed we should read it with the same good sense we apply to every other book: by genre, by intent, and by the use of language.
Let’s try this: Imagine someone insisting that because a soldier says he “gave his life for his country,” he must still be buried under the flagpole at city hall. No one talks that way. We all understand what it means: sacrifice. Courage. A metaphor made vivid through language. And the Bible? It does that all the time.
Let’s look at a few “9 to 5” style expressions in Scripture that skeptics (and some overly literal readers) tend to stumble over.
“Three Days and Three Nights” – Matthew 12:40
Jesus says He’ll be in the tomb “three days and three nights.” Then He dies Friday, rises Sunday, and someone pulls out their calculator and shouts, “That’s not 72 hours!” Well, in the ancient Jewish world, any part of a day counted as a whole. Friday afternoon, Saturday, and Sunday morning = three days. No stopwatch needed. It’s the equivalent of someone saying, “I’ll be there in a sec,” and showing up in 45 seconds—not perjury, just language.
“All the World Should Be Registered” – Luke 2:1
Caesar Augustus decreed that “all the world” should be registered. Global census? Did he really get census forms out to the Mayans and aboriginal tribes in Australia? No. “All the world” meant the known Roman world. That’s how people spoke. Much like when someone says, “Everyone’s seen that movie,” and you resist the urge to say, “Actually, I haven’t.” We all get the point.
“The Sun Stood Still” – Joshua 10:13
Joshua prays, and the sun “stood still.” Skeptics smirk: “So the Bible thinks the sun moves around the earth?” But we say things like “sunrise” and “sunset” all the time. No one calls the weather app a science denier. This is what we call phenomenological language—describing what’s seen from a human perspective. God isn’t giving an astronomy lecture; He’s telling a story of divine intervention.
“Hate Your Father and Mother” – Luke 14:26
Jesus says, “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father and mother… he cannot be My disciple.” Wait—what? Is this the same Jesus who told us to love our enemies now telling us to hate Mom?
Here’s the key: “hate” in this context is a Hebrew idiom meaning to “love less” or to “choose another over.” He’s not teaching cruelty—He’s teaching priority. If following Christ puts you at odds with even your own family, loyalty to Him comes first.
If that still feels jarring, consider this: if your spouse says, “I love you more than anyone,” they are not implying hatred for your cousins. It’s a comparison, not a declaration of loathing.
“Forty Days and Forty Nights” – A Repeating Pattern
We see this number everywhere—Noah’s flood, Moses on the mountain, Jesus in the wilderness. Did someone sit down and count 960 hours every time? Maybe, but it’s more likely that “forty” was a symbolic number of testing and preparation in Jewish thought. Kind of like saying “a million times”—we don’t mean exactly one million; we mean “a lot.” The number carries meaning beyond math.
Objections and Responses: Understanding the Bible Isn’t 9 to 5… But It’s Still the Job
1. “So… you don’t take the Bible literally?”
Response:
Oh, we do. We just don’t take it woodenly. Taking the Bible literally means we read poetry as poetry, laws as laws, parables as parables, and metaphors as… not construction materials. When Jesus said “I am the door,” He wasn’t claiming to have hinges and a doorknob. We believe the Bible means what it says—as it was meant when it was said. That’s actual literal reading, not the “I once lost a debate to a metaphor” kind.
2. “If God wanted to communicate clearly, why use idioms and metaphors at all?”
Response:
Because He’s not writing a cereal box. He’s revealing Himself to humans—in human language. And humans, even in 900 B.C., used figures of speech. He spoke through real people in real cultures using real language. Want a sterile, literalistic list of bullet points? Try an appliance manual. Want the living Word of God? Then understand that God will speak in living languages (in this case, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek), poetry, prophecy, sarcasm, and some ancient agricultural metaphors.
3. “Why didn’t God just write it so everyone could understand it without needing help?”
Response:
That’s like saying, “Why didn’t Tolkien write The Lord of the Rings with fewer Elvish words?” Because depth matters. God isn’t hiding the truth—He’s inviting us to dig for it. Proverbs 25:2 says, “It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.” In other words: He hides Easter eggs in the script—not to frustrate us, but to make seekers into finders.
4. “Why not just stick to the ‘plain reading’ of Scripture?”
Response:
Because the “plain reading” depends on whose glasses you’re wearing. A first-century Jew hears “three days and three nights” and nods. A modern reader reaches for a stopwatch. “Plain” isn’t always plain—it’s often assumed. Reading the Bible wisely means asking, “How would the original audience have heard this?” Not “How do I, as a Wi-Fi-using, emoji-texting modern, interpret this at first glance?”
5. “Aren’t you just making excuses for contradictions?”
Response:
No, we’re making explanations. There’s a difference. If four people describe the same car crash from different angles, we don’t throw out their testimony—we stitch it together. If every Gospel agreed word-for-word, skeptics would cry “collusion.” But when they vary slightly—like real witnesses do—they cry “contradiction.” You can’t win either way. But you can make sense of it by realizing the Gospel writers weren’t robots—they were reliable humans with unique emphases.
6. “If God is all-powerful, why didn’t He make the Bible foolproof?”
Response:
Because He didn’t make foolproof, He made faithproof. God isn’t trying to create a test you can pass with a calculator—He’s inviting a relationship. Interpretation takes humility, patience, and (brace yourself) study. Jesus spoke in parables not to make things easy, but to reveal truth to those who were willing to lean in. If you want TikTok theology, you’re going to be disappointed. If you want truth, it’s all there—just not in bite-sized slogans.
7. “Why not just give us a divine glossary or FAQ section?”
Response:
He kind of did. It’s called the Church. When the Ethiopian eunuch read Isaiah, he said, “How can I understand unless someone explains it to me?” (Acts 8:31). Enter Philip. God didn’t just hand us a book and walk away—He gave teachers, preachers, apostles, pastors, scholars, YouTube theologians (the decent ones), and apparently Dolly Parton fans with blogs. We’re meant to read the Bible in community, not in isolation.
8. “Isn’t this just slippery postmodernism—saying it means whatever you want?”
Response:
Nope. This isn’t “make-your-own-meaning” night at the salad bar. We’re not saying the Bible means anything. We’re saying it means something—and that “something” is found through context, culture, and careful reading. Postmodernism says truth is relative. Christianity says truth is a Person. We’re not playing word games—we’re trying to understand what the Word really says.
So What’s the Point?
If you can understand that someone working 7:00 to 3:30 is still allowed to say “9 to 5,” then you already know how to read the Bible more wisely. God didn’t choose robots to write Scripture. He chose poets, fishermen, kings, shepherds, prophets, and tax collectors. He allowed them to speak with the rhythms, expressions, and imagery of their world—and He still inspired every word.
To honor the Bible doesn’t mean flattening it. It means reading it with understanding.
Literal where intended, poetic where written, symbolic where signaled, and always alive.
So the next time you hear someone nitpick Scripture like it’s an IKEA manual, you might kindly ask them, “Do you work 9 to 5?” If they say yes, you’ll know they’re ready to understand how the Bible speaks.
With truth.
With beauty.
And in a language meant for humans.
Tom's Theology Blog 
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