It’s the dilemma every new parent faces: How do you help your child learn, as early as possible, to love good and healthy food? It kept us up at night. The challenge is especially difficult in a world filled with empty carbs, sugar, soda, and fast food. How could a kale salad ever compete with a chicken nugget? For us, this became a critical concern during our son’s earliest years. Our desire was not only that he would eat well but that he would want to eat well. Teach a child to eat a healthy meal, and you feed him for a day. Teach him to love healthy food, and you feed him for a lifetime.

It is one thing to give someone the good, the beautiful, and the true. It is another thing entirely to awaken within them a desire for the good, the beautiful, and the true. This is true for food, but it is a similar challenge when it comes to spiritual matters. I am a Bible professor at a small Christian liberal arts university. Theology and the Bible make up my day job. But it is an unusual vocation. Even though I teach at a Christian university, nearly all of my classes include agnostics, atheists, Buddhists, Mormons, and Muslim students, alongside those who identify as Christian. Believing in the Bible—let alone liking or loving it—is not a prerequisite for students to find themselves in one of my courses.

That makes my job challenging. Why? Because a good lecture is not enough. Like a parent, I want to awaken in my students a deep desire for Scripture. If that desire can be awakened, the storyline of their lives may begin to change. My job is to teach the Bible; my deeper goal is to awaken the hearts of students—whether they love God or care about Scripture or not—to the beauty of the Bible.

1. Be Wildly in Love with the Bible

To begin, if I want to give something away, I must first embody it. There is little more compelling than a deep and abiding love for Scripture burning within me. The passion kindled in my own heart spills into my lectures and warms my classrooms. You cannot fake this kind of desire. Nor can it be captured in a PowerPoint or Google Slides presentation. The desire must be real. It must genuinely pulse through the veins of my own heart. Why is this important? Because desires are sticky. As a child, I remember sitting by the window of our home watching my mother work the soil and grow tomatoes. She would spend entire afternoons beneath the hot Oregon sun tending the garden—turning the soil, planting tomatoes, trimming unwanted branches, and caring for her plants. Her desire beat with the heat of that Northwest sun.

By watching her, that passion was planted within me. I love tomatoes. And I cannot help but believe that my deep affection for Oregon-grown tomatoes grew from the rich soil of my mother’s own love for them. There is a principle at work here: We absorb the desires of those

around us.

When we read Scripture with this idea in mind, we begin to notice some striking connections. Consider Israel immediately after their deliverance from Egypt. When they arrive at Mount Sinai—where they remain for nearly a year—Moses descends the mountain with the law of God only to discover that Israel is worshiping a golden calf. Why a golden calf? The answer is simple: Egypt worshiped bovine gods. Israel had spent four hundred years in Egypt. Even in freedom, they reflected the worship patterns they had absorbed in slavery. The desires shaped by centuries in Egypt were not shed overnight. The real challenge of the Exodus was not getting Israel out of Egypt; it was getting Egypt out of Israel.

We often absorb the sticky desires of those around us. But the reverse is also true: What burns within us can ignite others. When I am truly on fire for the Bible, that passion inevitably begins to kindle the hearts of those around me.

2. Name Bible Shame

Years ago, my wife and I were building a structure in our backyard. As we worked together, she asked me to go into the garage and grab a Phillips-head screwdriver. I nodded, walked into the garage, and opened the drawer that held our tools. As I looked down into that drawer, I was unexpectedly overwhelmed by a flood of emotion. I sat down quietly and began to cry.

Why would searching for a Phillips-head screwdriver make me sad?

When I was a child, my parents went through a painful divorce. As a result, I was largely raised by my mother. I cannot remember a single moment in my childhood when someone taught me what a Phillips-head screwdriver was. I did not even know what it meant. So, standing there and looking into that drawer, I felt waves of sadness—not only because I did not know the difference between the tools in front of me but also because I did not want my wife to know that I did not know.

Few would deny that biblical illiteracy is on the rise in the Western world, and it is a real problem. Yet there is also a hidden blessing within biblical illiteracy. More often than not, my students come to the biblical text with entirely fresh eyes. For many of them—including many Christian students—the Bible feels new, unfamiliar, and unheard. In a strange way, the gospel is finding a whole new audience.

But there is also a real downside to biblical illiteracy, especially for Christians. Many students enter the classroom carrying the quiet sense that they should already know the Bible. They immediately feel shame because they do not understand the very thing they believe they are supposed to know.

Bible shame is what my students experience when they feel embarrassed for not knowing the story of Scripture. And when I name this reality—that I once felt ashamed for not knowing something I thought I should know—it almost always moves someone in the room to tears. As a Bible educator, I try to normalize the feelings that often accompany biblical illiteracy—not because I want to normalize biblical illiteracy itself but because I want to address the shame people carry for not already knowing the story of the Bible. Naming that shame often frees students to be honest about their ignorance. They are allowed to not yet know the story of Scripture.

3. Teach the Mechanics of the Bible

Returning to the issue of biblical illiteracy, we often alienate people when we assume they already understand the Bible—where it came from, how it is structured, and how to use it. It is like the preacher who stands up before reading a passage and says, “I’m going to read a text you’ve probably heard before.” That may be one of the most unhelpful comments a preacher can make—for two reasons. First, the comment subtly communicates embarrassment about rereading Scripture to the congregation. Yet most churches cover only a small portion of the Bible’s stories, so we should never assume people already know them. Second, the comment makes those who have never heard the text feel like failures for not knowing it. In that moment, the preacher may unintentionally contribute to Bible shame.

Most of my students, whether Christian or not, do not even know how to find a verse in the Bible. Smartphones and Bible apps can hide this problem, but when students are handed a physical Bible, many have no idea where to begin. Even with the convenience of technology, many do not know what a verse is, or a chapter, or even a book of the Bible. Some do not know the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament.

I admit this is how I often feel when people begin talking about politics. There are countless things I simply do not understand. I do not have the Constitution memorized. I do not fully grasp the nuances of the separation of powers. And my lack of basic political understanding often keeps me from entering deeply into those conversations.

The same is true with the Bible. In many ways, half of my students’ engagement depends on gaining the basic skills needed to navigate Scripture. They need to know the difference between the Old and New Testament, how many books are in the Bible, and how to locate a chapter and verse. When students finally learn how to find a passage on their own, their confidence skyrockets.

If my politically-minded friends want me to love politics, they first need to help me understand the mechanics. In the same way, if I want others to love the Bible, I must help them discover the mechanics of Scripture. Without these foundational skills, it is difficult for anyone to move forward.

4. Confess the Things That “Keep You Up at Night”

This is one of my favorite aspects of teaching the Bible: the hard texts. I still remember an evening in seminary when I asked our Old Testament professor what part of the Bible kept him up at night. He openly admitted that he struggled to reconcile the love of God with some of the commands for violence in the Old Testament. His honesty became a bridge that deepened my own love for Scripture. He loved the Bible, and that was precisely why he wrestled with it.

Loving the Bible is not the same thing as fully understanding it. All of us encounter things in Scripture we cannot fully explain. In many ways, that is a sign that we are taking it seriously. Augustine of Hippo is often credited with saying, “If you comprehend, He is not God.” The same principle can be applied not only to God but also to the words of God. Scripture is filled with mystery, beauty, and difficulty. There are still passages that keep me up at night. And when I am honest about that with my students, they almost always sit up a little straighter and lean in more closely.

Why does this matter? Because many students have been taught that belief should only extend to ideas they already like. Our social media age is built around surrounding ourselves with voices and perspectives we already agree with. We are increasingly encouraged—and technologically equipped—to curate our own self-made worlds of truth. But we are not called to like truth; we are called to believe it. There are parts of the Bible I do not naturally like. Who likes the doctrine of hell? It is difficult and unsettling. But we were never commanded to like hell; we are called to believe what Scripture teaches. As C. S. Lewis often suggested, we are not called to fully understand communion before participating in it—we are called to receive it.

There is balance needed here. I am not suggesting we force people to confront truths they are not yet ready to bear. We shepherd sheep, not camels; it is not their responsibility to carry burdens they are unprepared for. Great discernment is required. Yet part of awakening a love for the Bible is being honest about the passages we ourselves find difficult. Such honesty communicates that we are thoughtful readers of Scripture. We wrestle. We think. We struggle with questions just like everyone else.

And that honesty sends a powerful message: If this person can love the Bible, maybe I can too.

5. Show Ways in Which They Already Believe the Bible

This is a crucial part of helping students awaken a desire for the Bible: helping them recognize the ways they already, often unknowingly, believe many of its core ideas. The reality is that if we live in the Western world, we inhabit a society deeply shaped by the biblical story and the Christian narrative. Don Cupitt is an atheist philosopher who has actually written at great length about this. In his book, The Meaning of the West, he writes about how deeply Western culture has been shaped by the Christian story:

Nobody in the West can be wholly non-Christian. We cannot help continuing to be influenced by the old dreams, as for example Marxists, anarchists, utopians, Martin Luther King, John Lennon, and Jürgen Habermas were when they all continued to pursue some version of the old biblical vision of a fully reconciled, free and open future society, the messianic Kingdom here on this earth. Whether or not you personally think of yourself as being a Christian does not very much affect the extent to which Christianity goes on influencing your hopes and your dreams… You may call yourself a non-Christian, but the dreams you dream are still Christian dreams, and you continue to be part of the history of Christianity. That’s your fate. You may consider yourself secular, but the modern Western secular world is itself a Christian creation.

Don Cupitt—again, an atheist—is making a critical point. Many people living in the Western world already believe aspects of the biblical story without even realizing it. Take justice, for example. Many of my students do not believe the Bible’s story in a formal sense, yet they are deeply committed to justice—to doing what is right for other people. When they discover that justice itself is profoundly shaped by the biblical tradition and that many of the men and women who fought against slavery and racial injustice in American history were motivated by a passionate love for Scripture, it begins to change their perception of the Bible.

To discover that they already believe parts of the biblical story without being aware of it awakens within them a desire to explore further.

I spend a tremendous amount of time helping my students recognize the ways the Bible has already shaped their lives, often without their knowledge. The results have been breathtaking. I have watched students slowly open their hearts to Scripture.

In conclusion: As a parent, I want to help my son love good food. And, as leaders, shepherds, pastors, we want to see those around us love the Bible. There is a way to do this. And when we do, we are changing the trajectory of someone’s entire life story.

Like you, I want those around me to fall in love with the Bible. Why? Because it is the best story the world has ever heard. It is about dimensions of love and grace they could never have dreamt of. But that requires that we do some hard work to help others come to the text the right way. I may be responsible to love all my students where they are; it is also my passion not to let them stay there.

When we do that well, we may very well be lighting others’ hearts on fire for the same story that has lit ours.

Notes:

Augustine of Hippo, “Sermon 67 on the New Testament,” New Advent, accessed June 25, 2026, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/160367.htm.

C. S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer (Harcourt, Brace & World, 1964), 104.

Don Cupitt, The Meaning of the West: An Apologia for Secular Christianity (SCM Press, 2008), 67.

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Author Bio

Rev. Dr. A. J. Swoboda (Ph.D., Birmingham) is the lead pastor of Faith Center in Eugene, Oregon, and is the associate professor of Bible and Theology at Bushnell University. He is the lead mentor of the Doctor of Ministry program in Christian Formation and Soul Care at Friends University. He is the author of many books, including The Gift of Thorns (Zondervan), After Doubt (Brazos), and the award-winning Subversive Sabbath (Brazos). He hosts the “Slow Theology” podcast (with Dr. Nijay Gupta) and writes the widely read “Low-Level Theologian” Substack. A. J. lives and works on an urban farm with his wife and son in Eugene, Oregon.

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