Allowing Room for Reconstruction
A Review of
Better Ways to Read the Bible: Transforming a Weapon of Harm into a Tool of Healing
Zach W. Lambert
Paperback: Brazos Press, 2025
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Reviewed by Daniel Jesse
Zach Lambert sets out to help people “take stock of the assumptions they bring to the text and how those assumptions impact interpretation.” He states that “everyone who reads and interprets the Bible does so with a set of assumptions about what the Bible is and how it’s supposed to work.” The whole book, then, is looking at the “lenses” that people use, their assumptions and already existing interpretations, to read the Bible. He names some lenses as harmful and then offers alternative lenses to read the Bible through. He understands that “there is no neutral or unfiltered way to read” the Bible and is not trying to hide his own presuppositions or lenses. (7)
The book comes out of a personal quest where Lambert tries on “dozens of lenses and humbly asks Jesus to lead him to the most Christlike combination” (36). Christlikeness is his standard for what is harmful or helpful. He asks while examining the lenses he names whether they allow us to see more or less of Christ and if they lead to a life that reflects who Jesus is.
Though he does not offer a systematic treatment of who Christ is, he does name God as being loving, merciful, good, just, gracious, and kind (21). He also hints that God, therefore Christ, is a God who is concerned with personal and communal flourishing (28). In that vein, he talks about how he was taught that Jesus “is meant to give us hope for life after death” but Lambert is looking for a God who also gives hope in life before death, that is hope for us right now. By doing so, Lambert shows us early on in the book what lens is most important for him. Lambert is looking for a lens that allows the Bible to speak life and hope to the here and now and not just in the there-after.
Lambert names four lenses that often lead to harm. Those are the lenses of literalism, apocalyptic, moralism, and hierarchy. Literalism is the lens that allows people to read the Bible as being black and white (41-44) and factual (44-46). This lens allows people to hide their biases behind the Bible, plainly stating truths that hold universally. This allows people to say, “The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it.” The apocalyptic lens offers a vision “of the world burning, family members being raptured, and all hell breaking loose” (65). It is a view that what we do here does not matter. The moralism lens makes the Bible “a rigid rule book that exists to teach us right from wrong” (83). Finally, the hierarchy lens claims that “the Bible exists to tell us humanity’s pecking order” (100).
Lambert then offers four “healthy” lenses to replace the old lenses with; the Jesus lens, the context lens, the flourishing lens, and the fruitfulness lens. The Jesus lens shows that all of Scripture points to Christ. The context lens highlights the importance of where verses and stories are placed (135). The flourishing lens asks the reader to see where liberation exists (151), while the fruitfulness lens asks us to read the Bible with the fruits of the Spirit in mind (170).
Lambert’s work leads the reader into better ways to read the Scriptures, avoiding the traps of reading our own desires into the text. Lambert is giving us what his title tells us: a better way to read the Bible. Throughout the book, he offers personal stories and stories of those he has encountered on the way to show the harmfulness of certain lenses and how other lenses can offer healing. I would like to think that such a work would help people process their own ways of reading the Bible and question if their way is harmful or helpful.
One lens that Lambert misses is the univocal lens. Lambert seems to operate under the idea that the Bible has one unifying underlying message of Christ’s love. By not recognizing that lens, Lambert fails to contextualize some of the biblical messages and how they would have been understood in the context in which they were written. He also uses that lens to avoid having to deal with some of the harder texts in the Bible.
Overall, the book is accessible and makes many salient points and can help someone find a better path forward in their faith. It is a book that I wish existed many years ago to help mitigate issues of complete faith deconstruction. Lambert’s work offers a tool for future generations to deconstruct their faith in a healthier way, while still allowing room for rebuilding.
Daniel Jesse
Daniel Jesse is a Humanities and Theology Professor working with AI inside and outside of the classroom, a Christian Worship researcher, and occasional preacher. He writes about Emotional Formation in the Church on Substack at: danieljesse.substack.com
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