In this episode, we'll hear from John Launchbury on preconceptions about passages.

It's tempting to think that when we open our Bibles, we can read what's there without imposing our own thoughts or perspectives on the text.

Indeed, it would be unsettling to imagine that our preconceptions about a passage may so deeply color how we understand the message that we might be absorbing as much a human message as a divine.

The purpose of this article is, uh, to alert us to this challenge, to encourage all of us to constantly ask the question, how much of what we think about a passage is actually coming from the text, and how much is coming from us? We'll look at three examples.

Let's start with the parable traditionally entitled The Prodigal Son from Luke fifteen.

We almost don't need to read it before discussing it because it's so familiar.

But, but maybe that's a symptom of the problem that we're exploring.